Bridge to Somewhere
by behindabruise
Summary: The stitches that held the cuts across her wrist together were still swollen. The leaflet he held about a mental institute shone back into her eyes.They needed to escape. Could it have been luck that sat them beside each other? JxA! GRAPHIC! COMPLETE!
1. Spinning

**The shiny black stitches that held together the jagged slices across her wrist were still bright and swollen. The pamphlet he held regarding St. Paul's Mental Institute for Men was reflecting sunlight into his eyes, making it quite noticeable to everyone on the bus. They were both unhappy and trying to mess themselves up. They met on a public bus. It was a dark love at first sight for Alice and Jasper.**

**This is a fanfiction story about the travel from darkness to light from the same author who also brought you **_**Sell my Body to the Night **_**and **_**Just One Night. **_**Alice and Jasper are in for quite a trip though; Bridge to Somewhere is an awfully long ride.**

**~E~**

**AxJ is pretty adorable as well. So, here ya go. Don't forget to review.**

_I can't remember when the earth turned slowly . . . So I just waited with the lights turned out again . . . I lost my place but I can't stop this story . . . I'll find my way, but until then . . . I'm only spinning . . ._

Alice Brandon was just coming back from the hospital after her uptight parents had rushed her over there when they saw the deep and bloody slashes that had been intentionally scratched into their daughter's skin–well, it was more like she was running away. Her parents were probably still in the lobby, signing some release papers and forms for therapy, which Alice could not handle. She needed to get away from her damn parents–so she ran right out that hospital, and boarded a bus whose route she did not know. She just wanted out.

Jasper Hale was going through the same sort of ordeal: his parents thought he was demented like Alice's parents did her. Except, Jasper's parents weren't as willing to "throw away their money on something stupid like therapy" on their lonely son. But they had said it enough times and insulted him with it enough times that Jasper was sick of it. His parents had convinced him he was mental. And he was going to fix himself to satisfy the ever-growing need inside him to please all people around him. He had grabbed his thin wallet and the pamphlet for St. Paul's Mental Institute for Men his friend, Emmett, had snagged for him after one of his group therapy sessions. St. Paul's was on the other side of town, so Jasper hastened out the door, not looking back. He hopped onto the bus that was heading out there, absolutely silent. That was, until he saw a ghost of a beautiful girl glide in, her face bleak but very annoyed and serious. That's when Jasper inaudibly whispered to himself, his first word of the day, "Whoa."

She was the most beautiful thing he had ever seen. Her pearly white skin was creamy and smooth. Her big, doe-eyed blue eyes were haunting and mesmerizing. Her short black hair was done up in limp black spikes that gave her tiny, and extremely thin frame the edge it needed. She gave off the strangest vibe, it seemed to Jasper: it was happy, perky, but completely smothered by dementia and a strange type of sorrow. _Quite a strange combination_, Jasper thought to himself, his brow furrowing.

Alice's breath suddenly caught in her throat. In the very back of the bus, sitting beside the only vacant seat, was an angelic man about her age, seventeen, with surprising hazel eyes and wavy, honey-colored hair that brushed over his smooth face. He had pale skin, though it was nowhere near as pale as hers, Alice noticed. He was lean and muscular, but not heavy and bulky. Alice breathed in a deep breathe. _He's perfect_, she thought to herself, her eyes widening.

The girl's big blues eyes flickered to Jasper's face. He was a bit surprised, but then realized he had the only unoccupied seat right beside him. She was going to sit next to him. He gulped nervously, an old and quite annoying habit of his.

She began to weave her way over to him. Jasper then noticed how she walked: it was as if she wasn't even touching the ground. She was floating. But it was more than that, it was . . . was . . . what was it? Unearthly was what it was. It looked like she was dancing without touching the ground. Even in her super tight jeans.

Alice took another step. It seemed painfully hard to move closer to this wondrous boy who seemed to barely be registering Alice's existence. Her breathing became uneven as she came closer to him.

The girl sat beside Jasper. His heart quickened, but he kept his breath quiet. He noticed the girl, rigidly perched on the edge of her seat, seemed to barely be noticing his presence. He sank a bit, but tried to ignore it; he was not on that bus to make a friend. He was on that bus to check himself into St. Paul's Mental Institute for Men to be back in his parents' good graces.

Alice rummaged around her jean's pockets, and pulled out an iPod that was almost as thin as she was, if that was even possible. She put the earplugs in her ears and tried to relax with her music as she had intended when she stepped onto the bus.

But before she could even start constructing a playlist for herself, the boy beside her murmured in a silky tone that made Alice's blood run cold and her spine rigid, "What are you listening to?"

He had done it. He blurted it out in his shaky voice but wished he hadn't. The beautiful girl was staring at him now. Great.

The corners of her thin, blood-red lips pulled up a little in an effort to construct a soft smile. Jasper gave a tiny and undetectable sigh of relief. "I was thinking about listening to The Servant," she said in a dulcet tone that milked the air in its buttery sound. It was like nothing Jasper had ever heard before. "Maybe Shiny Toy Guns. I don't really know, I suppose."

Damn be her squeaky voice Alice inadvertently used when she terribly nervous or scared. She should have said Britney Spears or something to seem cool. Those bands were obscure. But much to Alice's surprise, the boy smiled a delicious simper, and said with a chuckle in his voice, "Cells is one of my favorite songs."

Alice was dumbstruck and so glad she hadn't lied to seem cool. Damn Britney Spears to hell; she sucked. "I know; it's great, isn't it? The lyrics are my favorite part. They're . . . they're just so interesting." She smiled just a little bit more.

Jasper made a mental note to act like himself more often. If he could start conversations with beautiful angels like this girl with just his regular old personality, he should have started doing it a long time ago. "Lyrics are my favorite part of a song."

Her face lit up. "Mine too," she murmured. She laughed a little; the sound was like a thousand bells, ringing in harmony. It temporarily disorientated him. Jasper wanted to hear it again. He wanted to hear it forever. He wanted to make her smile and laugh. It was the strangest fascination he'd ever had; he blamed it on whatever his mental disease was though. That didn't mean he couldn't entertain it a little bit though, right? So, as he laughed with her–_laughter is contagious,_ he reasoned with himself–he asked her, "What's so funny?"

It worked–the ghostly girl burst into little fits of beautiful, melodic laughter. She smiled wide as she laughed. It made Jasper sort of . . . happy. "Nothing, nothing," she said between giggles.

_Damn, what is wrong with you, Alice?! Whatever, he's laughing too_, Alice thought to herself as she tried to control her ridiculous and uncalled for fits of laughter. Once their laughter had died down, it got quiet. Alice didn't like it quiet; not because she was a chatter-box or anything, but because she loved hearing this boy's voice. She wanted to hear more of it. "I'm Alice, by the way. Alice Brandon," she said, her old, perky self bubbling to the surface a little bit. Alice's cheeks flushed, and she tried to suppress it though. She stuck out her hand, offering a shake, mechanically. "So, you've got to have a name, right?"

Without thinking, Jasper grasped her tiny hand in his large, calloused one. "Alice . . . that's a pretty name." A blood-red blush crept into her cheeks. It was almost as good as making her smile and laugh, but not quite as good. "I'm Jasper Hale."

Jasper liked Alice's hands–they were soft and gentle. He'd never experienced something so soft. He smiled. He liked Alice a lot.

"So, where are you headed?" she asked, her silvery voice echoing in his ears.

He silently cursed himself. She was going to hate him if he told her he knew there was something wrong with him, and he was going to a mental institute. Jasper gulped; there was no excuse for this one.

Alice frowned because Jasper was frowning. Seeing him upset made her upset as well. Then the contents of the bus blurred, and turned into a dirty street in the "poor part", as her mother called, of Manhattan: the Lower East Side. It didn't seem that bad to Alice though.

Jasper was standing in front of a large brick building. The bricks were gray and covered in vines and dead plants that were scaling the building. It looked scary and uninviting. Jasper seemed to be thinking the same thing: his face was regretful and guilty. He was gulping nervously. He crumpled up the pamphlet in his hand and walked into the building. During the very last split-second of the vision, Alice saw the name of the building, which was written in big, dirty white letters above the old and rusted door: St. Paul's Mental Institute for Men.

The bus rematerialized right in front of Alice's eyes. Jasper was still faltering; he appeared to not have noticed anything at all.

Then the words fell out of her mouth like running water: "St. Paul's Mental Institute for Men?"

Her tinkling voice held so much concern and puzzlement that Jasper was momentarily stunned because truly, no one really spoke to him like that. He didn't know what to say. He then noticed Alice looked a lot like a pixie when she was concerned.

Her fingers were like lightning as they snapped in front of his face, bringing him back to reality and out of his Alice tangent. "Well?"

Jasper was speechless and dumbfounded at her honesty. She was going to think he was some sort of psycho freak if he told her the truth. "Well . . . ," he began before sudden realization came to his mind. "Wait a second; how did you know where I was going?"

Alice's eyes widened with panic. No one knew. No one. How could she slip up like this, and in front of a complete stranger who looked so much like an angel? Her deep blue eyes flickered back and forth, wishing she could just disappear, evaporate, like her visions did when they ended. But before she could even begin to think of another excuse for her brutal honesty, it popped up again as she said quickly, "I see visions of the future. I saw you walking into their building."

He nodded. He didn't seem at all freaked out or scared. Alice's brow furrowed, and she bit her bottom lip in perplexity. "So . . . do you think I'm a complete retard? Mental and unable to do anything?" He was changing the subject back to himself for some reason. Alice was grateful to it though.

Alice gasped. Jasper was genuinely shocked at her response. "No, of course not! Why would I ever think that of anyone, Jasper?"

The lower lid of his left eye twitched. "Because I'm putting myself in a mental hospital."

"So?"

Her bluntness–it was almost as beautiful as her face. There was something about this uncanny flaw in Alice that made Jasper like her even more; he didn't really meet many people who were honest and in a completely harmless way. She was honest but not using it for spite against, like his parents did. He smiled at her. He then whispered, most likely because he was embarrassed, "Thanks."

She smiled a tiny smile; even that asphyxiated his heart. "You have nothing wrong with you, Jasper. Actually, you're comparatively normal."

"Compared to . . . ?"

Alice took in a deep breath. Whatever the hell was wrong with _her _was going to tell Jasper anyway. Maybe he would repay the favor, and pretend she wasn't a complete freak. At least Alice was genuine when she didn't think Jasper was mental.

Jasper waited patiently for the answer. What could be so awful that _this _girl, with the underlying perkiness that was just waiting to bubble up, seemed so hesitant to tell him? Then again, he was a complete stranger to her. But that hadn't really seemed to affecting much lately anyway. So he'd just wait. It was fine.

She'd wait. It was bound to come anyway. Because that's what Alice's brain did.

**What's the secret?! What's going to happen next? Are Al and Jas truly normal at heart?! Well, we'll just have in the next chapters!**

**Reviews. They make me quite happy. So let's leave a few!**


	2. Enjoy the Silence

**WARNING, WARNING, WARNING: EXPLICIT DRUG USE IN THIS CHAPTER!!**

**It's sort of a one-time thing, but it needs to be there. Have no fear though, it will be WAY less graphic in future chapters ******

**Enjoy and review **_**por favor!**_

_All I ever wanted . . . All I ever needed . . . Is here in my arms . . . Words are very unnecessary . . . They can only do harm_

Alice squirmed in her seat. She shut her mouth and pursed her lips. She began to shake, her face wound up in concentration–but it was no avail. She blurted out, "I don't know what's wrong with me. I see visions and various hallucinations. I hear voices of people I don't know and can't see. I'm brutally honest, and I can't help it; it just slips out. I mix up my words and thoughts involuntarily, and have basically isolated myself from society. I don't have friends. My parents are like strangers! This all started happening when my sister, Cynthia, killed herself a few months ago. I don't know what's wrong with me," Alice cried out, her words running together, as she looked down at her feet.

Jasper gazed at her. A millions thoughts raced through Alice's mind: _does he think I'm a freak? Does he care? What _is_ wrong with me? Is he going to take me back to the hospital?_

He took in a long breath. Alice watched him as he seemed to analyze her rushed words. It was like she could see everything going on in his head: the processing, the judging, and the concluding; she was enthralled as she watched as Jasper studied what she had said. So when he finally spoke, it caught Alice a bit off guard. She jumped when he decided slowly, "It sounds like you have a case of schizophrenia."

Alice was still feeling a bit bombarded at the abruptness of Jasper's analysis. She tried to make sense of the conclusion and–maybe because she mixed up her words often or maybe because she was still just a bit surprised–stuttered, "Schizophrenia? Schizophrenic? You mean, I, how do . . ."

"My best friend, Maria, became schizophrenic. My parents made fun of her when they finally hospitalized her. Actually . . . she was just like you, Alice."

"Your parents don't seem like very nice people," Alice remarked before she could stop herself.

But Jasper shrugged. "No, they're not. They're the reason I'm checking into St. Paul's." He turned his head the other way so Alice couldn't look into his eyes. He didn't want her to.

"What did they do to you?"

"They would tell me I was sick, I had an illness. They would say something was wrong with me, but they didn't want to pay for therapy and hospital bills. They both continually insulted me with it, telling me I was mental and needed to get out when they were angry. I finally got so fed up with it that I decided to get myself fixed. I was going to check in today. I need to please them."

Alice looked at her tiny snow-white hands. "I'm so sorry."

He shrugged again. "That's why I'm on this bus."

She nodded, continuing to stare at her hands. There was a short period of time before Jasper spoke to Alice again. She knew what he was going to say all the while though. So when he finally asked, "So why are you on this bus?" she had an answer.

Alice pulled down the left sleeve of her brown sweater, revealing the newly sewn slashes across the skin. "I wanted to kill myself," she said, "so I cut myself. My parents caught me in the act, and rushed me over to the hospital. The cuts were so deep they had to use stitches to heal them. I stayed overnight, and my parents came for me this morning. While they were signing some papers and stuff, I just . . . walked out."

It was his turn; Jasper nodded. "You just wanted out?"

Alice looked him directly in his hazel eyes. "Yeah."

The two shared a casual smile. It began with the pulling at the edges of Alice's ruby lips. Jasper followed, going further that his counterpart though. Then Alice grinned widely, exhibiting two rows of tiny, pearl white teeth. Jasper did the same, both his eyes and teeth glittering. They were about to lean into each other when Jasper noticed the flickering of light while Alice noticed it was pitch-black outside and that they were the only ones on the bus.

The two exchanged worried glances. Where were they going to go? What were they to do?

"St. Paul's is probably closed down for the night," Jasper uttered more to himself than to anyone else.

"And I never had anywhere to go anyway," Alice replied.

Jasper gave a tiny smile. "You wanna go somewhere?"

Without thinking, Alice nodded in acceptance.

They exchanged another glance. Mischief flashed across Jasper face, confusion across Alice's. Jasper pulled away smiled nonchalantly, holding in a secret Alice wasn't too keen to know.

But Alice did raise an eyebrow. She didn't even need to say anything, not that she could anyway–the bus driver interrupted them by saying, "Last stop. You gotta go, kids."

Jasper was as quick as a bullet; he was up and over to the front of the bus in a second, saying in a low, shady voice to the large bus driver, "Can you drive us somewhere, please? It's not far, and after all, we are just children. Teenagers, if you will." He leaned a bit closer. Alice strained to hear him say, "The girl is actually only eleven."

It wasn't an uncommon assumption or accusation–Alice did really look like an eleven-year-old, though she was seventeen. It irked her nonetheless, so she crossed her arms indignantly, and gazed out of the smudged window.

She heard the bus driver sigh and agree. Jasper gave him an address she didn't know and was back in his seat in a flash of a second just like last time. They didn't speak–Jasper smiling arrogantly to himself, Alice still staring out of the window, miffed–as the bus began winding into another neighborhood.

Alice didn't recognize the neighborhood at all. The buildings were tall, brown, rusty, and overall, unattractive. Garbage littered the streets and overflowed out of forsaken garbage cans. Stray pets such as cats and dogs lurked around the corners of blocks and out of alleyways, as if they'd never seen a vehicle–let alone one that was as giant as a public bus–before. It made Alice shutter, seeing the forgotten pets, their tiny ribs poking out of their skin, their faces thin and hungry. She began to worry about where they were, but didn't want to break the silence. But just as she concluded that, she divulged to the window, "Where are we? I mean, where are we going?"

Jasper looked at her though Alice was still turned away. He sighed and explained, "My cousin, Edward, has a place around here. I told the guy Edward's address. He'll be okay if we stay in his apartment a few days . . . if you want to go there."

Alice smiled and met his gaze. "I'd like that. It's not like I have anywhere else to go, people to see, things to do. So, what's your cousin, Edward like?"

Jasper shrugged, but continued to uphold Alice's watch. "He's actually okay. A bit of a druggie though . . ."

Alice let her head roll back and sighed loudly. She closed her eyes, and spoke more to herself than to Jasper, "God, what I wouldn't give to shoot up some good heroin right now . . ."

Jasper let his mouth topple open in surprise. "You? You've done heroin before?" She nodded. "I'm sorry; something tells me you're not that sort of person." He smiled a bit.

"Well, my parents don't want me to be, that's for sure. When they found out, I was sentenced to solitary confinement for months. I'd been doing enough drugs to keep me stabilized that long before they caught me though, so it wasn't that bad."

"Where'd you get a needle?"

"My grandma has diabetes. She lives with us too. So I just swiped hers. My parents didn't think much of it, just that she had lost it, so it all worked out well."

"How'd they catch you then?"

"I lit up a joint in the backyard after my sister and I got into a fight. We rarely fought. And she had hit me, so I was a bit distraught. I didn't think my parents were home, so I stormed outside, and lit it up. I didn't have anything heavier on me and I needed to . . . be somewhere else, so I just grabbed a lighter and lit up. My parents saw the light from their bedroom window, and raced downstairs to find me doing exactly what they feared I would."

"How did you even get into drugs? Your parents seem really overprotective." Jasper sounded completely shocked.

"Cynthia introduced me to them. I'd go out with her friends, my parents trusting the pretenses that we were just doing some 'sisterly bonding', as she use to say. We'd go to a bar, she'd swipe a beer or two for me, and then we'd go out back with some of her friends and do all sorts of things. I never did that much because they thought me too young for some certain things, but I've done some pills, weed, and heroin. I took maybe five different prescription drugs when I cut myself yesterday. Swiped them all from Mom's medicine closet." Alice rolled her head back and smiled at Jasper.

He grinned, and then chuckled. "Impressive."

Alice blushed. "Thank you. It's really not that much. Just the standard stuff I suppose."

"You'll fit right in with Edward. He's been collecting prescription drugs forever. He does them all the time."

The bus halted in front of a small flat just then. It was dingy and rusted, like all of the other buildings around it. There was even more garbage in front of this edifice than the others. The two windows the apartment had were lit.

Jasper took Alice's hand involuntarily. She blushed, and Jasper pretended to think nothing of it. He wove his way to the front of the bus, leading Alice who was gripping his hand tightly. She didn't let go when they got off and knocked on the dilapidated front door. She didn't even let go when the door swung open, revealing a tall, lanky, and handsome–though nowhere near as handsome as Jasper, Alice noticed–man with dilated pupils that were so large, Alice could barely see the lining of deep green around them. This man, whom Alice assumed was Cousin Edward, was pale like Jasper. He had tousled bronze hair that seemed unusually limp. Judging from the purple, bruise-like spots beneath his eyes, it may have been because he hadn't slept in days, Alice guessed.

Jasper's finger tightened around Alice's. "Hey, Edward," he greeted him nervously.

Edward nodded in salutation.

Jasper cleared his throat. "Do you mind if we crash here for a bit? We don't have anywhere to go."

Edward had yet to speak. He merely nodded to Alice then.

"This is Alice Brandon. We're . . . friends."

Edward nodded to her. Alice was amazed when he said to her in a deep, soothing tone not unlike Jasper's, "Hey."

Alice nodded back. "Hey."

"Come in."

Alice and Jasper walked in together, fingers still clasped. They walked into a living room, where a circle of three other people and an empty space was situated. Alice observed the group that was staring up at them, their eyes as dilated as Edward's. There were two girls and a boy. One girl had long, golden hair and sky-blue eyes. Her eye makeup was dripping, and her lipstick was smeared. The other had mousy brown hair and matching eyes. She wore no makeup, which made her sallow skin and hollow face more noticeable. Alice was a bit appalled to see such an unhealthy girl, but then saw a syringe in her arm and a bottle of morphine and chunks of heroin and cocaine lying in front of her. _Speedball_, Alice thought to herself, somewhat impressed.

The third member of the group, the boy, was large and muscular with curly black hair. He had an arm around the blonde girl with the smeared makeup. His skin was tanned and had dimples in his cheeks that were noticeable when Jasper glided over to greet him. They bumped knuckles, and then Jasper turned to Alice, and said, "Alice, this is Emmett –" the boy he had bumped knuckles with waved and smiled, "- this is Rosalie –" the blonde girl nodded in Alice's general direction as she searched through a pile of orange capsules, "- and this is Bella, Edward's girlfriend." Bella didn't even register Alice.

Jasper led Alice to a cramped little spot between him and Emmett. Edward sat down, cross-legged, beside Jasper and Bella. Rosalie was next to her and Emmett, who kept a good grip on her. Either Rosalie was his girlfriend or was very unstable at the moment.

Bella finally looked at Alice. She scanned her with her eyes slowly, as if Alice couldn't see her doing it, and then said enthusiastically, "Hey! Welcome to the club! Choose anything from the pile. We're just doing whatever right now."

"Friday night tradition," Edward added gruffly, Bella nodding and leaned into him.

Alice twisted her mouth, choosing. Jasper had already made a grab at a few of the prescription pills that he was swallowing dry. Edward was lighting a cigarette that undoubtedly had more than the usual stuff in there. Rosalie and Emmett were taking turns with the same syringe, injecting methamphetamine while Bella was snorting cocaine. Alice pulled out her own syringe and tube of morphine she had swiped from the hospital earlier today; she'd been dying to try a speedball.

After Alice had snatched the cocaine from Bella when she was taking a swing at Edward's beer and the unused heroin beside Rosalie and injected the combination of cocaine, morphine, and heroin into her system, things started to get more out of hand. In the back of her mind, she realized they were doing a sort of "rush the new guy" to her but with various drugs and alcohol.

Throughout the night, there had been numerous times which Alice thought she was dead. But each time, Jasper would pop into her line of vision, perfect and clear, unlike everything else, and pull her back from the edge of life and death. It was almost like a miracle; when she was absolutely certain that was the exact moment she would cease to live, Jasper was there. Each time, his honey-colored hair, hazel eyes, and pale and perfect skin revived her.

She stopped at maybe the fourth time she'd come too close to death after Bella offered her Ritalin and Klonopin right after she swallowed a few squares of LSD. At the last second, right before Alice was about to be taken, Jasper was there. It nearly gave her a heart attack though; even if Alice was ready, even sort of _wanted_, to die, being so close made her realize she wasn't so sure actually. It had always been a possibility, but up until that day, when she met Jasper on that bus, she wasn't so sure anymore.

So Alice stopped. She asked if there was somewhere she could sleep. Edward showed her the guestroom, informing her she and Jasper would share that room. She noticed Edward's friends were leaving as she was ushered to her improvised room.

Alice remembered collapsing on the bed. She remembered Jasper mimicking the movement. They both crawled under the sheets, fully dressed. Alice closed her eyes, shutting out the hallucinations–both the ones she usually had and the new ones that were brought on by the onslaught of different drugs taken that night–and fell asleep.

The last thought she remembered was: _The dark is so comforting._

The last thing she smelled was the old, musty scent of the yellowed sheets of the bed.

The last thing she remembered hearing was the door of Edward and Bella's bedroom slam shut.

The last thing she felt was the warmth of Jasper's arms coil around her in pure reassurance.

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	3. Look After You

**SORRY I'VE BEEN GONE FOR THE THREE WEEKS!**

**K, here we go:**

_There now, steady, love, so few come and don't go . . . will you, won't you, be the one I always know . . . when I'm losing my control, the city spins around . . . you're the only one who knows how to slow it down_

The orange morning glow was spilling into the tiny room in wide lines, due to the window's Venetian blinds. Jasper counted the lines six times. There were seventy-six. It was a long window.

After counting the lines of orangey tint, Jasper began to call Alice, who was securely wrapped in his arms, sleeping like a little child. It pained Jasper to wake her; she looked so beautiful, so seraphic, her tiny body rolled into a ball. Her little crimson mouth's corners were pulled up at the corners; Jasper suspected she was having some kind of happy dream. Little did he know that the fact that Alice was just in his warm iron arms was the reason she smiled so.

"Alice? Alice? It's time to wake up, Alice," said Jasper in his most gentle voice.

Alice stirred slightly. Jasper unwrapped one of her arms from her, and shook his sharp shoulder slightly. She stirred again, inhaled, and let her eyes flutter open. The captivating blueness of her pupils caused Jasper's throat to lock and close the second they were revealed. They held each other's gaze for a few moments before Alice's eyes glazed over–the blue becoming less punctuating–and her expression became worn and distant. Jasper frowned and muttered, "What's wrong?"

Alice sighed, and smiled, though it was halfhearted. "Every morning, there's a glimpse of time when I don't see anything: no visions, no hallucinations. I don't hear any voices. I feel genuinely normal. It's the very best part of my life." She rolled over onto her back, a hint of smile on her thin lips, and stared up at the ceiling. "And then, of course, they all hit me again like they did before I fell asleep." She chuckled. But that had Jasper wondering: had Alice's eyes always been that cloudy?

Jasper's mind shifted when Alice's ice-cold hand took Jasper's arm, and wrapped it around herself again. A ripple of some strange emotion tore down Jasper's spine when he felt her spindly fingers around his muscular arm. His breathing became strained and he shivered once, but Alice didn't seem to notice anything.

Alice rolled over back into Jasper's chest, in the same position she was in when she first awoke: curled up in a tiny ball, her nose nuzzling into his chest, her lips painted with the faintest smile. Jasper's breathing became that much more jagged. His fingers were limp around her. Alice appeared to notice nothing this time as well, but the strange emotion that had rippled through him when Alice had touched his arm was overtaking him. The sensation it was giving was like nothing he had ever experienced before: gentle yet strong, pure yet adventurous, right yet wrong. It made him feel uneasy because this feeling was unknown. To get rid of it, Jasper decided to offer to Alice, "Are you ready to eat?"

Alice opened her eyes, her smile wider. She lithely rose from the bed, like a dancer. As she did so, Jasper couldn't help but to admire her suppleness. Even after a night of drugs, drugs, and drugs, she seemed fine and completely impervious, a gift she must have learned from her older sister years before.

She pulled him out his reverie though by extending her hand. He took it, and his eyes glittered as he saw the miniature bones working in her fingers, wrist, and the upside of her palm. He noted the flawless ashen tint of her tender skin.

Jasper lifted himself from the bed, his calloused fingers gripping onto her drastically different hand. Alice led him to the door, opening it with her free hand, as she swung their intertwined fingers like a small child would. Jasper had to smile for this.

The two opened the door to the kitchen to find that Edward and Bella were already awake, wandering around. Edward had his hands on the counter, his palms facing downward, causing his shoulders to come up to his ears. Two lit cigarettes hung from his wet lips, the smoke spiraling upward, crowning him with a wreath of smolder.

Bella was at the stove, staring glassily into a frying pan with a spatula in hand. Her dull brown hair hung limply from a part that went straight down the middle of her scalp. Her mane finished at the small of her back, the ends frayed and split. Her skin was still very pale, but not in the angelic way Alice's was. It was even more sallow that morning, and showed some degree of a yellow color that hadn't been there yesterday, and made Jasper believe she was not very healthy. She did not remove her gaze from the eggs in the pan when the door slammed behind Jasper like Edward did, another contribution to that theory of his.

Edward smirked. "Hey, you two. How was your sleep?" asked Edward. His tone implied that he was wondering if Alice and Jasper had slept together, not slept separate and soundly. Jasper was a bit miffed at this, for there had been no sexual tension between them at all. It hadn't even crossed his mind, something Jasper was proud to say, considering his age and the beauty of his counterpart.

"Fine, thanks. Fell right asleep," Jasper replied. His voice had a certain sharpness that Edward recognized as telling him not to bring that subject up again.

Alice had slipped over to Bella, where she leaned against the grubby counter, her expression distraught, her body inclined toward Bella. She wanted Bella to notice her. It obviously made Alice uneasy to have someone not register the other people in the room.

But as soon as Jasper recognized all of this, Bella came to life. She lifted her eyes from the pan, threw the spatula up in the air–Alice making an expert move to catch it–and dropped down on Edward's back. Had her arms not wrapped around his neck before she plummeted though, she would have fallen face-first into his steely back. She was apparently fine though, for as she nuzzled her face into Edward's shoulder blade, her sunken eyes looking up at him in complete adoration and necessity. It was obvious to Jasper he was her world.

Edward turned swiftly, turning her over so rather her face was facing his own. He bent his lips down (he was much taller than she), and pecked her lips lightly, in a way two people who loved each other enough would. Bella's eyes seemed to become clear for a moment before misting over again as she returned to the frying pan and the browning eggs in it, and again, not taking note of either Alice or Jasper.

Edward puffed on his two cigarettes, infecting the mildewed air of the kitchen with the smoke.

"You two, uh, want any breakfast or anything?" he asked, his eyes directed toward Alice, who was paying more attention to her feet, obviously distraught over Bella.

"Sure," she mumbled.

Bella then burst into a fit of hysterical laughter, scaring everyone, even Edward. Her yellowed knuckles turned bone-white as she gripped the pan's handle, laughed again, and whipped it at the wall, dodging Edward's head by an inch. It crashed into the wall, not shattering, but leaving a huge hole. Bella fell back on the stove. She yelped when it burned her, but did not remove her arm; Alice had to do so for her. Edward only seemed a bit disconcerted by this episode. He automatically opened his arms, and Bella fainted into them while Alice gasped, covering her mouth with her hand, and Jasper rushed over to her side involuntarily.

Edward carried Bella over to the threadbare sofa, where he placed her there gently. He kneeled beside her, stroking her dull hair, smoking his two cigarettes profusely. Something in Edward seemed to have flipped because he seemed worried for Bella, and obvious contrast from the tough guy he was a moment ago.

But Edward then sighed and began to explain, "Every morning, she takes these painkillers. She's not meant to take them, but she does. The instructions say one pill. She takes three. She faints like this every morning. She'll be fine when she wakes up in a few moments. It happens every morning, really, but she'll be fine. She'll be fine, I know she will, she always is. She'll be fine, really . . ." Edward began stroking faster, whispering, "she'll be fine" under his breath. It seemed to be his mantra, something he repeated to himself just to be comforted. Alice watched him with worried eyes. Jasper worried for all three of them, especially Edward, whose personality had just flipped completely.

All of a sudden, Bella breathed in sharply, her eyes burst open, and her body jerked upward. She extended her hands, reaching outward, though her fingers were curled back in a way that looked painful to her. Bella seemed awake yet not. This did not matter to Edward though; happiness sailed over his face, and he nearly attacked Bella as he enveloped her into a tight embrace. He kissed her shoulders, closing his eyes in relief, as she slowly, mechanically let her own arms fold around him as well. This scene brought budding tears to Alice's eyes. Jasper twined his arm with hers, stopping at the wrists–he was too nervous to hold her hand.

Edward helped Bella into the foldout table a few feet away from the sofa. He sat her in the matching foldout beach chair, holding her arm and the small of her back, whispering to her sweet reassurances. Jasper and Alice followed them, seating themselves in the other two available chairs. Edward hurried to pull out one extra chair from the nearby closet, unfold it, and place it right up next to Bella's.

Jasper couldn't help but to marvel at the affection Edward appeared to hold so much of for Bella, even it was the complete opposite of what he'd been displaying only a few moments ago.

Bella wasn't even beautiful, yet Edward stayed by her through anything, it seemed. Edward had a rough exterior, but his soft spot was she, for sure. He was her rock, but he relied on her just as much, only his relying was an emotional one, it seemed to Jasper. He needed her simply to function. But this perplexed him: if Edward required her so for his own well-being, then why did he continue to let her pill pop? Jasper knew that if Bella continued to swallow the random pills she did not need in the way she did, one day, she would cease to breathe. That was a given in Jasper's eyes. But why couldn't Edward see this obvious revelation?

Jasper could see Alice was thinking the very same thing. The way her eyes glinted with a strange engagement that was letting her whole brain work on it, and the way she was biting her bottom lip absentmindedly, too occupied to even acknowledge she was doing so, satisfied Jasper's speculation of her seeming to notice the same thing. They both watched Edward's shaky eyes and fingers comfort Bella.

Bella turned her head and looked at Edward. He kissed her, and then offered something to eat. She nodded, and whispered pancakes. Edward retrieved the pan she had flung across the room not twenty minutes ago, and started cooking.

The four ate their pancakes off of paper plates. Edward appeared to have returned to himself, for he went back to the counter in the open kitchen, and lit two cigarettes.

What was strange was he smoked them as he ate, a skill that had Alice watching him from the corner of her eye before she finally decided to throw down her plastic fork, look at Edward with a burning sense of curiosity, and say, "Doesn't the food taste like smoke?"

Edward placed his fork across his empty plate. He put his elbows up on the table, and wove his fingers together, laying his chin on them, but not before taking a quick drag of his cigarettes. He watched Alice, intimidation flickering in his green eyes. He took another drag, combed his left hand through his disheveled bronze locks, and then sighed. "When you've been smoking as long as I have, everything taste like smoke, kid."

"Alice," Jasper muttered without thinking. He did his best to keep his cheeks from turning bright red. "Her name is Alice."

Edward sniggered to himself. It was peculiar to see how he had changed from worried and unsure of Bella to a sudden tough guy again. "Alice, is it?" He was not looking at Alice.

Jasper looked down at his hands. He felt stupid. Why did automatically feel so protective, so caring toward Alice? They hardly knew each other. They met on a bus. They came from completely opposite worlds. And she was schizophrenic! This wasn't normal. He never felt this way about anyone or anything. The feelings were unrecognizable. They made him feel uneasy. It was all unknown, and it he didn't know what to do about them either. Jasper gulped, his cheeks suddenly flaming.

"So, Alice, why don't you take a little walk with me, eh? Jasper and Bella can stay here and clean up. What do you say, kid?" Edward asked Alice as he snuffed out his cigarettes on his plate, leaving two grainy black spots behind.

Bella whipped her head around, and stared at Edward. Her eyebrows fell over on top of her eyes, whose brown color was wavering with worry. She rested her shaking hands on the table. Edward rested his hands over hers without looking at them, though it seemed to comfort her a bit. Still, she did not seem absolutely _unworried_ yet.

Alice's thin lips contorted into a horizontal "S". She glanced at Jasper. When her eyes flashed to him, he could feel his stomach flip over and his heart begin to thump like a jackhammer. He tried to look away. He didn't like those feelings. Instead, he watched Bella with feigned concern for her mental stability.

Edward rose, and strolled over to the counter, where he lit up two more cigarettes, and began puffing away.

Alice's eyes were puncturing little and unseen openings into Jasper's cheek. He barely had any control when it came to Alice, so he met her gaze. She mouthed, "Should I?"

Jasper had reason enough to trust Edward: they were cousins. Why would Edward do anything to Alice, someone Edward knew he cared for? But then again, Edward was a smoking druggie. Things could be going on in his mind that Jasper didn't know about, and he certainly didn't want anything to happen to Alice because of Edward. The inhaled air burrowed in Jasper's throat. He nodded. In the back of his mind, he thought the indistinguishable feelings would go away if he let her go, like he would anyone else.

Edward smiled arrogantly–his signature smile–and ambled back over to table. He took Alice's hand, and helped lift her from her seat. He glimpsed over at Jasper, saying, "I hope you don't mind cleaning up with Bella?" Jasper shook his head.

Edward crooked his elbow like a gentleman while taking a drag from his cigarettes, holding them both expertly in one hand. Alice looped arm through his, looked back at Jasper only once, and was led to the front door by Edward.

Jasper was left alone with Bella, who was now morosely staring after Edward, penetrating his back with her dull brown eyes. Jasper swallowed. This girl looked like she wasn't going to be able to handle time without Edward. Edward seemed unaffected.

How could he be so unaffected though? Just a few minutes ago, he was reassuring _himself_ that everything would be fine while Bella was unconscious. How could he up and leave her now? What was with his strange personality changes?

Jasper glanced to Alice, who was staring at Edward. He could see she was thinking that as well by the way she was looking up at him with her slanted eyebrows and absentminded lip biting.

Edward waved his hand without looking back. "We're going to get to know each other; be back in a few," he informed us, chuckling slightly, still not looking back.

Jasper's stomach did another flip.

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	4. The Saltwater Room

**Back again for another exciting chapter :DDD**

_Like an introvert, I drew my over shirt around my arms and began to shiver violently . . . Before you happened to look and see the tunnels all around me . . . Running into the dark underground . . . All the subways around create a great sound . . . To my motion fatigue: farewell . . . With your ear to a seashell . . .You can hear the waves in underwater caves . . . As if you actually were inside . . . A saltwater room_

Alice wasn't afraid _of_ Edward, she was afraid _for_ him: he was acting a bit odd, wasn't he? Or at least, that's what she would repeat to herself over and over again in a futile attempt to ignore and or eradicate the rising bile in her throat.

Edward and Alice were out on the grimy streets of his neighborhood. They had been walking for a good bit of time, Alice repeating her mantra the whole way, Alice's arm looped in Edward's, but he stopped her briefly, untangled himself, and began walking ahead. She didn't know why he had suddenly done this, but it calmed her somewhat, so she wasn't going to complain. She had also spent the past twenty minutes he was ahead of trying to push that question out of her head so she wouldn't blurt it out like she usually did. The memory of Jasper helped in that.

The smell of hot garbage intensified in Alice's nostrils while the lingering scent of brine fused with it, creating a horrifying odor that caused Alice to cover her nose. The source of the brine was soon discovered though: they were nearing a pier, where seagulls flocked and brown watered waves stormed beneath.

This pier mystified Alice though.

The water was brown and dirty, and chunks of garbage and driftwood cluttered up the body of water. Barnacles, turned a rusty brown color with age, were rampantly sticking to the legs of the pier and hundreds of seagulls assembled around; they were in the skies and on the rickety brown wood. They were in the water, catching stinky blue fish that were causing even more of a smell. Everywhere.

The dock was disgusting, and would have repulsed anyone, but to Alice and Edward, it was mystifying. It held a secret, something desirable, even though it, itself, was no more desirable than a pair of soiled underwear. Alice couldn't quite put her finger on why, but she had to go to the dock, to be near it. It was a symbol of something to her, and she was desperate to understand it.

_Creak! _Alice was pulled back into reality by the sudden sound, and started walking again; for some reason, she had stopped. She looked ahead of her as she walked, and watched Edward make more creaking noises as he traveled up the little staircase that led to the dock. _Creak, creak, creak. _It was deafening to Alice, but she longed to make the sound herself, with her own shoes. _Creak, creak, creak. _She relished the moments she walked up the stairway, for it belonged to the old rickety dock, which she loved so much for no apparent reason.

Edward was waiting on the pier for her. He lent her his hand as she approached the final step, obviously trying to be a gentleman. She grasped it as she made the final _creak _and then was able to descend down the pier to the very end that looked out on the lake.

Edward let go of her hand and they began to stroll down to the end. Alice could feel excitement bubbling in her, and when they reached the finish, she exploded. She was beaming, her eyes shining, her cheeks flushed, as she looked out onto the filthy, browned lake. It was truly a repulsive, upsetting sight, but she was excited anyway.

She heard Edward chortle to himself behind her. "You must like lakes," he remarked, taking a drag.

Alice blushed, shrugged, and turned away so she was facing him, though she couldn't bear to take her eyes from her feet and stare directly at him. "I don't know," she whispered.

Edward chuckled again. He placed his thumb under her chin, and lifted Alice's face so their eyes locked. Alice wasn't sure she liked looking into Edward's eyes; they were a beautiful green color, it was true, but they were worn and distant. It made Alice the slightest bit uneasy when she saw the detachment woven in the wavering jade.

"Why ya squirming?" he asked her. Alice hadn't realized she had been trying to divert his watch until then.

Alice removed his long fingers from her pale chin. "I am sorry." She turned back to the grimy brown waters. "I don't really like looking into your eyes, Edward."

His voice sounded a bit faded as he turned to look out over the waves as well. "Why?"

"They're so distant and worn out. Like you've seen so much; too much for someone like you." Alice resisted the urge to cover her mouth, try to put back the words she had accidentally blurted out.

But he did laugh, though it was not a merry one–instead, it seemed a bitter one. It made Alice's skin ripple. "I suppose you're right, Alice. I've seen a little much for . . . me."

"How old are you?"

"Seventeen."

Alice gasped, and whipped around to stare at Edward. "You're _my age_? But you live in a house! You have a girlfriend! You've gone to school! You must be lying to me!"

Edward merely sighed, and leaned forward, resting his elbows on the pier's restricting rail, and looked out over the mucky waves. He took a drag. "No, I'm really not."

"Yes, you are!"

"Don't go embarrassing yourself, Alice."

"You must be."

He sighed again. "I was orphaned only a few months ago, a week before my seventeenth birthday. Emmett helped me get a job . . . and into drugs. I met Bella, a failing college student, when she came by the bar, depressed as hell. I convinced her to drop out and live in the apartment I had bought with my dead parents' money, just as friends. And now look at me; I've seen too much, Alice. Too much."

_Just as friends._ The phrase stuck in Alice's head like a mouse to a snapped mousetrap.

"Like what?"

Edward laughed his bitter laugh again. "Too much!"

But Alice was much too persistent for her own good. "Like?"

Edward seemed to just waver there. A leftover smile, embedded with sourness, was noticeable on his bright red lips. And his eyes didn't have the usual lively flicker, but the flicker of someone who was remembering the past. "I have Dissociate Identity Disorder. I'm never me anymore. I'm always someone else . . ." He abruptly buried his face in his hands, making Alice jump. His voice was muffled when he spoke again, "This isn't me; none of it is. I haven't truly been myself for weeks now; I'm always someone different! I'm not even sure Bella loves me _for me_! I hate what I've become, because it sure as hell isn't me anymore, I know! And I probably will never be my old self again." Edward drew a cigarette from his mouth as he took a drag from the other. "Take it."

Alice did. She'd only smoked pot before, so she pretended it was just another joint: inhale, close your throat, and breathe out. Alice took her first drag, following the steps. It seemed to be working just fine. She took another. She liked the taste of fire on her tongue.

"Thank you. I've never smoked a cigarette before. Just pot," Alice stated, taking her place beside Edward. They both looked out onto the lake, smoking their cigarettes.

"How do you like it?"

Alice shrugged and blew some bluish smoke that curled around her head. "Pretty good, I'd say."

Edward chuckled. "Pretty good . . . You know I had my first cigarette the day my parents died? Yeah, before that, I was your regular good, little boy. I didn't smoke or drink or do any drugs. I listened to my parents, did my best in school. I even went to church! But the day my parents died . . . something in me snapped. I wanted to be a different person for a while. So, I suppose, in a way, I created an alter ego for myself. Emmett believes that was the base of my DID, because after that I was having mood swings like a teenage girl, flipping from nice to mean, good to bad; always opposites. I visited my dad's friend, who was a physician, and he told me I had different Edwards living in my head. I went crazy after that. I was solid drunk and or stoned for the next two months. And after that, I was never my old self. I'm always someone new nowadays."

"That's . . . crazy!" Alice cried, for lack of a better word to use. But Edward burst out laughing. Alice giggled too. "I can't think of anything else to say!" she added.

"Crazy? Well I guess so if I have different personalities living in me!" His laugh was booming, but it was reassuring in a strange way. Alice liked the sound of it.

The two paused for a while and caught their breaths. Alice watched the waves lap up against the pier and listened to the seagulls squawk and go after each other. It was relaxing to come out to the water and just breathe in the brine for once; Alice had never been to the beach or a lake before, so she savored every moment of the calming atmosphere. Even if the lake was absolutely filthy and disgusting, just the simple sounds and smells of it all were enough for Alice.

But being Alice, she had to break that silence–unintentionally, of course. "So how are things with you and Bella anyway?" Alice blurted. Instead of covering her mouth with her palm, she decided to puff up some more blue smoke.

"So blunt . . . " Edward remarked under his breath. But Alice heard him anyway.

She shrugged. "It's the schizophrenia. It makes me say things, see things, hear things. I'm sorry if you can't handle it, tough guy." She nudged his elbow and giggled.

Edward smiled, but it was fleeting. "So you and Jasper . . . What's _really_ going on?"

"Really going on, huh? Well, nothing, I'd say. We're two people who met on the bus, who had no place to go and everything in common. It's not any mystery as to how we found each other. We were just at the right place, right time, I suppose."

"No strange feelings though? Nothing you see a bit appealing in Jasper? At all?"

Alice let a shaky laugh escape her lips. "You're just taunting me."

But now that Edward had mentioned it, she couldn't help but to conjure up that mystifying emotion that churned in the pit of her stomach every time Jasper's name was spoken. She couldn't help but to think back to the strange way her heart started to hammer so loudly she'd fear someone would hear it whenever she could see Jasper's handsome face. And she definitely couldn't help but let the scarlet blood rush to her cheeks the second Jasper's name found her ears.

Alice didn't really know what these feelings meant for she'd never experienced them before. They were a mystery to her, a secret that had yet to be unlocked. She longed to know what it was about Jasper that her stomach stirring, her heart pounding in her ears, or her cheeks blushing though. There was no answer.

Alice took another drag, and stared out at the ocean, wondering about Jasper. But the sensations that were racking her body like a tsunami soon became too much to bear. She had to distract herself.

"Are we going back any time . . . soon?" she asked, her voice steely and abrupt.

Edward sighed, and threw his used cigarette to the sea. Alice watched him do this and then mimicked the movement. "Are you _ready_ to go back?" Edward asked, his voice hoarse from the smoke.

Alice nodded.

So they ambled away from the end of the dock, back to the miniature stairway. Alice kissed her palm, and placed it on the rail; she loved the pier and everything it had ended up just teaching her.

The two continued walking down the street the briny air being replaced with the strange odor of hot garbage. Alice covered her nose, but Edward didn't really notice–he had his hands stuffed in his pockets, and was staring straight ahead, though appearing to see nothing. Alice walked beside him as she had a vision of them opening the door of the apartment and finding Bella and Jasper playing cards.

They returned to the house, smelly and tired. And sure enough, Jasper and Bella were playing a card game in silence, as Alice had predicted. They hardly looked up when she and Edward came in.

Edward breezed over to Bella, and kissed her cheek. Bella looked up, smiled, and rested her hand on his cheek, silently asking him to kiss her again, which he did. Alice slithered over to Jasper, and sat on the arm of his foldout chair. He smiled at her, and the hairs on skin leapt. Oh, that smile! It was dazzling, and blinded Alice in every aspect: his glittering white teeth, the radiance that shone through, and the sheer, uncontrived shape his lips could light up the whole city.

"We were just playing some cards. We got a little bored," Jasper informed her, his voice like a thousand angels.

Alice smiled coyly. "I know; I saw you."

Jasper's brow furrowed, his expression playful. "What do you . . .?"

"A vision."

Jasper smiled again, which made Alice's internal organs somersault with joy. "Of course."

Alice took her eyes off of Jasper for a minute to glance at Edward. He was kissing Bella passionately, but not in a way that made Alice want to push her hands between them in order to make them stop. It was sweet, sort of adorable, but she could help wondering if it was the real Edward shining through to Bella or if it was a fake, one he had created in his mind to escape the tragedy that had suddenly become his life months before.

Alice sighed. She leaned forward, and took the cards from the table. She shuffled them together, and handed Jasper then deck. Lighting up another cigarette, she asked nonchalantly, "Wanna play?"

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	5. Rainbow Veins

_And cold nights make staying alert so hard . . . For heaven's sake, keep me awake, so I won't be caught off guard . . . Clearly I am a passerby but I'll find a place to stay . . ._

_. . ._

_Cheer up and dry your damp eyes, and tell me when it rains . . . And I'll blend up that rainbow above you . . . And shoot it through your veins . . . 'Cause your heart has a lack of color and we should've known . . . That we'd grow up sooner or later . . . 'Cause we wasted all our free time in love . . ._

"So what did you do with Edward?" Jasper's voice was tainted with his masked concerned. But Alice saw right through, and giggled. Butterflies soared inside her stomach.

"Nothing much . . . just kissed some," Alice replied casually, as if such a happening was nothing. Jasper turned to her, his expression utterly horrified. But Alice just laughed, the beautiful terror upon his face allowing her to feel free. "Kidding!" she added between mirth.

Jasper gave one, unconvincing chortle. "Oh. You really can't joke like that with me, Alice."

Tears of amusement collected in the corners of her eyes. "But you're so cute when you're completely aghast like that!"

Jasper took notice to the beads in her eyes, and wiped them away. "Now, Alice, you're going to cry or have a fit! But seriously; tell me, what did you do with him this morning?"

Alice glanced at the clock on the nightstand beside the guest bed. "It's four o'clock."

Jasper rolled his eyes. "Whatever. I mean this _afternoon_."

Alice smiled for his willingness. And then with complete comfort, she spewed everything, "Well, we walked a bit, and to tell you the absolute truth, and I was sort of afraid, but Edward began walking ahead of me, so it ended up being just fine. Then we got to this dock; it was smelly and kind of repulsive, but I really liked it for some reason. Anyway, we went up there and sort of just traded stories while looking over the dirtied waves of the lake or whatever it was. It was nice. There's something about water that makes me exceedingly calm, you know? I realized that today. I tried a cigarette as well. Edward offered me his other; you know how he carried two? He gave me one." Alice took a drag to demonstrate. "And I really liked it. Very relaxing. I definitely like these now. And then we sort of talked about you for a bit, and then we decided to just come home. Nothing to worry over, Jasper. I had fun. Edward and I sort of became friends, you could say. Detailed enough for you?"

Jasper laughed. "Yes."

"So, you and Bella? How was the card game? Is she all right? Not truly batty, I know, but . . . she gives reason to worry sometimes."

"I take it that you're one of those _crazy_ people that worries about everyone they know?" Alice shoved him playfully, barely making an impact on him. "It was quite a neutral day. Nothing important here either, but your excursion with your new boyfriend, Edward, seems much more exciting, don't you think?"

"I don't like him like that! I was kidding, really kidding!" It was meant to be playful, but it came out all wrong; Alice sounded distressed, like she was trying to fix something between them.

Jasper eyed her suspiciously. "I was only joking, Alice. Remember? Jokes." But it wasn't convincing at all to Alice, and that made her a little more distressed; the mechanisms of her mind were already off, but this changed the gears for worse, because then something in Alice's brain felt like it had dropped off its invisible perch. She teetered to one side, losing her balancing, her weight throwing her off. She lifted her opposite leg for support. Jasper clutched her shoulders to steady her. The cigarette dropped from her open mouth, and burned the carpet. Jasper stomped it out as Alice's head was suddenly spinning, and the room was just a foggy blur for a second. Alice squeezed her eyes shut as tightly as she could to make it stop. When she opened them again, there was Jasper's cool hands on her forearms and an array of hallucinations.

There was a giant pink elephant, two blue enlarged cockroaches scuttling about at her feet, and a bone-white teacup with acrimonious eyes staring at her from across the room.

These things confused Alice, for her hallucinations were _never _like this; they were usually fleeting blobs and shapes in random corners or behind things – never distinct, like these. Alice gulped, and felt her head begin to reel once more. She backed into Jasper, frightened of these new hallucinations she was seeing. Or so she thought _she_ – and everyone else – was seeing.

"Holy fucker, do you see them? They're everywhere!" Alice cried, her arms wrapping around Jasper's waist, resting on the small of his back, involuntarily. It made Jasper titter and squirm a bit, but Alice was paying no attention to anything but the things she saw.

"See what? What are they?" he asked her delicately, softly, though she could hear a sort of nervousness or uneasiness quiver in his words. It was a mixture of worry for Alice and surprise at the way she was touching him, but Alice couldn't see that.

So Alice's patience was wearing quite thin. "Right there! The elephant, the roaches, and that evil little teacup over by the window! You see them? Oh, you have to! These can't be hallucinations; they're not like my usual ones! These are too _distinct_!"

Jasper cleared his throat, and readjusted his grip on Alice. "I don't see them, Alice. They _must be_ your hallucinations."

"They _can't be_."

Jasper loosened up a bit with a sturdy chortle, but quickly covered it, remembering how she had reacted last time he joked a bit with her. "They must be, Alice."

Alice was feeling particularly off now. No one could see these things, when she plainly could, which to a schizophrenic, was a very strange thing. And Jasper's emotions – which she would usually have been able to translate with ease – were now confusing and foreign to her as they rang in his demeaning – to her, at least – voice.

Something in Alice that day snapped. And it rendered her different from that point on.

"Do you need to sit?" Jasper's voice was swirling in her ears, ringing. It angered her. "Alice? Are you feeling well? Come, sit."

"_I'm fine, okay? Fine!_" Alice countered, her voice rising. "Just get me another damn cigarette!"

Jasper kept his grip on Alice steady as he shouted to Edward to bring his pack of cigarettes and a lighter. Edward soon opened the door, the items in hand, his face surprised. Jasper seized them from him and dismissed his cousin swiftly. Edward merely shrugged and left.

As Jasper lit up a cigarette and handed to Alice carefully, he whispered to her, "You're really not feeling alright, are you? Come here and just sit with your cig. We can play your card game, and you'll be just fine; everything will be fine. But sit, smoke, and calm down. Okay?" Jasper's voice was filled with raw concern and care, but Alice found it so patronizing, and she sneered.

She twisted herself out of Jasper's protective grasp, folded her arms, and pranced to the bed, sitting on the edge, and stared in the opposite direction, at the irate teacup, taking as many drags as she could without coughing. Jasper shuffled the cards as he strolled over to her, distracted by his work. He laid out the cards on the bed, and asked Alice what she wanted to play. She didn't answer. Jasper sighed and, dealt the cards, leaving some for a pile in the center.

Jasper stared at her. Alice could see an intensity in his face from the corner of her eye, but ignored it. "Go Fish."

So they played Go Fish. And the more they played, the better Alice began to feel, though the hallucinations never went away. She was feeling more like herself, even though she'd never truly be the same. But at least she felt fine. And by the end of the game, Alice was feeling better and as free as a bird, like she had before she snapped. She was smiling. Her hallucinations were smiling for her as well.

Soon, Alice was laughing. She felt good, better. She had _almost_ completely forgotten about what happened to her an hour ago, when she snapped. It seemed a distant memory to her, though the new delirium around her were constant reminders.

Alice snatched the last card from Jasper's hand and then screamed, waving her arms in the air, "_I win_!"

Jasper laughed. Alice's face melted into some sort of awe. His laughter . . . it didn't quite confuse her, but the lovely sound of it made her wonder how one being could make such a noise. It was like silver bells, all ringing in time with each other. Some of the bells were low and some were high, creating the most wonderful sort of harmony. And the melody was something that made Alice's smile wider. It went up and down in sound, but never octave, which would have made his laughter sound quite awkward. Alice had to sort of marvel at the sound, for she'd never heard any resonance as sweet or exquisite.

Alice snapped herself out of it. She was getting gooey, wasn't she? And she didn't need to be adding to the unrecognizable feeling that was growing in the pit of her stomach and lungs. It was consuming her; she couldn't eat and she couldn't breathe. It was uncomfortable at times, but in a way she concluded she could live with it.

She brought herself back again, scolding herself for letting herself go like this. It wasn't like her, and she knew Jasper would have none of it if he even suspected a drop of that _feeling_.

Of course, this was the disease making her think this. If Jasper had a hint of a drop of that feeling, it would have the opposite effect on him. He wouldn't quite say he'd be happy, but he certainly wouldn't not "have any of it". It perplexed him when he often thought about Alice, and them, together, as a couple, an item.

The two sighed in unison, though neither said a word, much less noticed, their timing.

Jasper did smile weakly though. "What? Unsatisfied about winning?" he teased, though that was probably not a very good idea, considering Alice's previous reactions and state of mind. But Jasper had sort of forgotten those things with her around.

Alice smiled back bitterly. "No," she said, her voice as acrid as her smile. "I was just thinking about things that really confuse me. Does that ever happen to you? Where things you should be understanding are absolutely confusing to you?"

Jasper shrugged, and dragged the cards toward him, and shuffled the deck again. "Not really. I'm just now experiencing it, now that you mention it." He frowned.

Alice leaned forward, and her fingertips brushed against his cheek. And then she murmured, "Don't frown." She did all of this before contemplating what it would mean for the both of them. Alice removed her fingers quickly, looking away as she did so.

And then Jasper did the same thing: he didn't think about his actions. He grabbed her fingers gently, and kept them steady where they were: directly below his chin. "I won't," he whispered.

Suddenly the air was heavy and it stuck to Alice's lungs when she breathed in. That made her breathing rather ragged, and then when you added Jasper's electrifying touch, her breathing quickened, and everything shifted in her mind.

Now, Alice's mindset was changed from "he couldn't want me" to "I have to have him. Whether it crushes him in the end, or not". So, I suppose you could say her worsening schizophrenia caused the next, unexpected scene to play:

Alice moved her head closer to Jasper's. Their noses were touching, side to side. And their lips were just a breath away. It startled Jasper, and he didn't quite know what was going on. Everything was going by very fast, and he was torn between letting it go at the speed it was going at, or slowing it all down so they could start from the beginning.

The next thing Alice did nearly forced him to let it go at the crazy speed. Nearly. A sliver of that decision was Jasper's.

So, what did she do?

She pressed her lips to his.

She pulled back almost immediately though, exhaled nervously. She wasn't going to leave out a fact that any normal person probably would have left out; her schizophrenia wouldn't let her.

"I've never kissed anyone before," she stated matter-of-factly, not giving it a second thought, though the blood behind her ears began to thud very noisily, which Alice became very aware of.

Jasper gazed into her eyes, his hazel color boring into Alice's blue. He smiled, his face aglow. She did not falter though. He smiled, and brushed his fingertips to Alice's chin. "You? The one who hung out with your older sister's friends? Who drank and did drugs with them?" he asked skeptically. She blushed, and looked away. Jasper sighed, feeling a bit guilty; she was telling the truth. "It doesn't matter though," he added with a small smile that had Alice looking to him once more.

"Have _you_ done it before?"

Jasper glanced the other way for only a moment before returning to her eyes. "I have . . ."

Alice's eyes shown, her face beaming. Her smile was slight, but it sparkled as she whispered to him, an air of excitement and anticipation in her voice, "Teach me."

Jasper pulled back. They were a safe distance apart, though their gazes held. Alice did not budge, but her expression dimmed when her other moved. "What?" she finally snapped when Jasper did not say anything after a few moments. "Can't you teach me?"

He shrugged and finally dropped the gaze. "I suppose."

"Then do it!"

Jasper did notice this was quite unlike the Alice he knew. But he paid it no mind; it was lost in that back of his brain, locked away in a mental drawer he unknowingly put things in so he could store it for later some contemplation. Right then, the only thing he was thinking of was if Alice was being serious or not. Even for some sort of confirmation, he asked her in a quite manner, "Are you certain?"

One of Alice's eyebrows traveled up her forehead when he requested this of her. "Negatory, Jasper. I asked you that because I like toying with you beyond normal playfulness."

Jasper smiled a bit unwillingly, and leaned back into her. Alice's expression immediately lit up again as she realized he had silently agreed to go ahead and teach her. He noticed she was illuminating the whole room with her excitement.

He pushed her lips to hers abruptly. Alice liked the feeling of being so connected to another though.

And so the "lesson" started. Jasper first opened his mouth, and then closed it again around her puckered lips, moving his head to the other side. This was a bit startling to Alice, but she kept up with it all, and mimicked the movement next, cupping her lips around his, and moving. She could feel Jasper smiling a bit under her lips, as if to say, "good." Then Jasper let his fingers brush past Alice's skin, moving stray hairs from her face, causing her skin to ripple. She did this as well, placing her hand to his cheek lightly, being sure not to place much pressure.

And then Jasper did another things that almost caused Alice to pull back instinctively. He opened his mouth again, Alice expecting him to move again, but instead grazed her bottom lip with his tongue ever so softly. This caused her eyes to burst open, and stare at Jasper's closed eyes before she could think about it. She blinked twice in confusion before he did it again. She forced herself to shut her eyes, though her instincts were screaming at her to keep them open and pull away from Jasper.

And then he slipped his tongue into her mouth so stealthily, so surreptitiously, it took Alice by surprised when she found it after she had closed her eyes once more. That time, her instincts were almost forcing her to pull back, though she never did. Instincts are clouded when your brain's functionality is thrown off by some sort of disease.

Jasper finally pulled back. Alice's eyes flew open. And she was just completely stunned!

She had never kissed before, and the experience it was giving her made her feel like every cell in her body was a live wire. She liked the strange taste it left in her mouth, the ecstasy that was running through her body like lightning, and the glisten in Jasper's eyes. She liked kissing. And she wanted more of it. And to go further.

Alice pulled Jasper's face back to hers, and imitated everything Jasper had done to her during her first kiss: the tongue, the stealth, the teasing, the opening, and the turning. Only she did it much quicker, moving at a faster pace that made her live-wired cells jolt.

She pulled away. "How was that?" she asked, amusement creeping into her voice, her face flushed.

Jasper laughed. "Good. Very good."

"I liked it."

"I could tell."

"It's like a whole other world, kissing. I liked it! It made me . . . better. Excited. Like there were rainbows flowing through my veins with my blood!"

Jasper chuckled. "Oh?"

Alice was like an animated child to Jasper. The way she went on and on into the story of their kiss, never stopping, never looking for acceptance from her listener, like a toddler would. It was like she telling the story to herself more than to him. But Alice could certainly be ingenuous; her childlike wonder was fascinating him.

"Cigarette." The single word snapped him out of it.

"What?"

"Cigarette. I need one. Come with me."

Alice rose, and began to dance toward the door. But Jasper caught her arm. "You're not going to tell Edward, are you?" He sounded truly worried about this prospect.

Alice rolled her eyes like a child, smiling, of course, and slipped her hand into his, pulling him to his feet. "I told Edward was nothing going on between us –"

"Nothing is."

Those two words discouraged her quite a bit, but she was afraid to show any more weakness. Her schizophrenia caused her to blurt out words, not emotions. "– so I won't say anything to him or Bella about our kiss. Don't worry, it'll be fine."

Even though Alice's dance was dimmed, it was still beautiful to Jasper as she led him to the door. But she hid her face, which was showing a considerable amount of anxiety.

She put on a more passive expression, and walked through the door, exposing them to the kitchen, Bella, and Edward, while her fingers remained linked to Jasper's.

**HOW did you like their kiss? Good, bad, medium? Well, here's an idea, and I'm just throwin' this out there, tell me about it IN A REVIEW! Tell me how I could have improved, toned it down, or just how awesome it was :DDD**

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**By the way, this was exactly 3,350 words. Chapter two was exactly 3,000 :D**

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	6. Cave In

_If the bombs go off . . . The sun will still be shining . . . Because we've heard it said that every mushroom cloud . . . Has a silver lining . . ._

_. . ._

_I've had just about enough . . . Of quote, "diamonds in the rough" . . . Because my backbone is paper thin . . . Get me out of this cavern . . . Or I'll cave in . . ._

"Nothing is."

"Nothing is."

_"Nothing is."_

Alice didn't know what that was supposed to mean. When she had told Jasper that Edward was informed nothing was going on between them, she had said that an hour ago. But, she had thought, maybe, that they had kissed and all, something was going on between them. She couldn't explain it, but she suddenly wanting Jasper to be so much more than just a friend to her. She had been praying that maybe, the kiss would lean them that way, but apparently, it hadn't, and Alice was dismayed at this. Why wouldn't Jasper be with her? They were good for each other. They had everything in common and didn't give a fuck about their lives anymore, seeing as they'd spiraled out into something so different from what they were before. There had even been a spark! Why was Jasper so afraid of them together? Alice's head was buzzing with this confusing piece of news.

A new hallucination, a miniature horse that was about the size of Alice, who was trotting beside her, whinnied in a way that sounded like laughter. Alice glared, and hissed to it, "Shut up!" Jasper glanced at her, but looked away, figuring what was true.

Fine. If Jasper didn't want her, she'd have to _make_ him want her. She had never tried to seduce or make anyone jealous before, but she had a pretty good idea of how to do it. She'd certainly heard enough of Cynthia's boyfriend troubles and how she always had to sabotage them in the end with elaborate schemes and pranks, which Alice sometimes got to help in. Alice took what she knew from older sister, and concocted a plan right there, as she entered the kitchen.

Edward was always changing; he had told her this. And Bella was insane, probably not even conscious of her surroundings half of the time. So, it _should be_ fairly easy to seduce Edward, which would make Jasper extremely jealous. Also, she could practice kissing on Edward, so when her time with Jasper finally came, she was ready. Alice comforted herself in thinking that when Jasper would have her, she would know exactly what to do with him instead of embarrass herself. Edward was merely a practice dummy for the real thing; you're welcome, Jasper!

Alice smirked, proud of her new plan. She was surprised at her knack for something she'd never done before. But really, it was the disease that was messing with her head; if Alice hadn't snapped, she wouldn't be doing this. She was better than that, until she changed so dramatically. It was too late now though.

Jasper, however, was thinking the complete opposite. He, on the other hand, was indecisive and nervous.

He liked Alice; she was bubbly and nice. She was funny, witty, kind, mysterious . . . things he found attractive in girls. But for some reason, he felt courting her would be a wrong, a mistake. His gut instinct was telling him not to tangle up in Alice. But his heart and manhood were both telling him to go for her: she was beautiful, fun, attractive, and inexperienced. They could have fun, he could teach her things! He should really get a jump on her before he screwed things up. But his mind, sense, and instinct all told him to back away, send her home.

So, obviously, Jasper was torn. He liked the feelings he had around Alice though: light and airy. Like an open window, with a breeze rolling through, brushing right over his heated skin. She made him confident and secure because he could make no fault around her, it seemed. He knew he had a serious liking to her, and that was natural: she was beautiful and unearthly. But oh how his instincts knew not to tangle up her, to leave her be! Jasper didn't know what to do, where to turn. Obviously, he couldn't send Alice away, onto the streets; she had nowhere to go or be! But she was so much temptation when she hung around him, like his mind was completely smothered, rendering it useless in telling him to stay away. Her face and expressions, her poses and composure, her speech and personality; they were all so tantalizing to him. She was almost the perfect girl to him, he thought. Little did he know, however, the complications roaring about within Alice, his perfect girl, as well.

Jasper was completely at a loss now. He gave up. He'd go wherever the flow would take him, he decided. Around Alice, he felt no need to be constantly appeasing her, as he did with everyone else. Alice was obviously special; and if he felt no need to live up to her, she wouldn't really care if he took his time choosing, right?

Obviously, that assumption of Jasper's was _very_ wrong. But Jasper certainly didn't know that.

_Just go where the wind takes you, buddy_, Jasper continued to remind himself. _No pressure. You have time, so spend it wisely. Go where Alice takes you, or where someone else does. Whoever gets there first. You can do this, kid! Just don't get sidetracked. Don't let Alice or anyone else distract you, or you won't be able to go with the wind. Keep reminding yourself this, and you'll be golden, man. Golden._

Jasper smiled slightly, only semi happy with his decision, and entered into the kitchen with Alice.

Their door burst open, and the first thing Jasper heard and saw was Edward, of course.

He lifted an eyebrow. "So what happened in there? You asked for a cigarette and then told me to leave . . . is everything okay?" he asked, skepticism creeping into his voice.

Alice grinned widely as she stepped forward to him. "Everything is just fine!" she cried, unhooking her hand from Jasper, and trailing it behind Edward, along the contours of his back.

Confusion ran through Jasper's head. What was that? They were only friends; Alice almost had a meltdown because he jokingly said they were together. So why was being she flirty with him? Always touching and being near him . . . he and Bella were both still in the room!

Jasper took the space next to Alice as she lit up beside the counter, from which Edward's feet her dangling, two cigarettes suspended from his opened lips. Both Edward and Jasper were eying her hand on Edward's knee as Alice took the first drag.

"So it's nearly six thirty. What are you and Bella doing tonight?" Alice asked casually, her fingers tracing patterns on Edward's knee, as if she didn't really realize she was doing so, as if it were a habit. But Jasper saw right through that.

Edward shrugged. "I don't know. We may go to a few clubs with some friends. You two are free to tag along if you want. But drink are not on me," he replied, and then took drags from his two cigarettes. Alice laughed. Both of the men eyed her suspiciously.

"What clubs?"

"There are a few in mind. We may even travel to Brooklyn – though how we get there is the problem, seeing as we have no money. Anyway, we're going to see this underground band Emmett has been crazy over these past couple of weeks in this old club."

Alice nodded, and then stated plainly, "I've never been to a club. Or Brooklyn. Or an underground band's concert."

"You ever have sex?"

Alice smiled devilishly. Jasper gave a tiny gasp, but no one noticed to his relief. She nestled into Edward slightly, looking up at him with her big blue doe eyes. "Nope."

Edward smirked. "Miss Virgin."

Alice laughed hysterically. One could even say emphatically. Edward and Jasper exchanged quick glances. What was going on with Alice? She never acted like that. Of course she blurted things and was a tiny bit quirky, but she never overdid anything or laughed at cheap Edward jokes. It was strange; too off for Alice.

Edward's brow furrowed. He looked down at her seriously, and lifted each of her eyelids separately. "Alice, are you okay? You're definitely not acting like yourself."

She giggled again, and gave his shoulder a playful shove. "I'm fine. So are we going to tonight or what?"

"Sure. Bella and I were going to go over to Emmett's actually. Do you and Jasper want to come?"

Alice's eyes glittered. "Yes!"

She then momentarily lapsed. She turned to Jasper, her eyes shining, her grin spread wide, and clutched his arm in excitement. Only until a second after did she realize what she was doing: the opposite of her mission. Her eyes flickered out like a vanishing fire, and her grin subsided. She paused for a split second, and then, still clutching Jasper, dashed into their guest bedroom again.

Alice was panting, and Jasper was confused. A second ago, they had been in the kitchen, speaking with Edward about plans for the night. Alice was flirting. Jasper was merely looking on. But then Alice grabbed his arm, and stared up at him, as if the kiss and Alice's sudden mindset shift had never happened. And then they were back in their room. Jasper took a moment to catch up.

When he was ready, he looked back to Alice, who had her back pressed against the wall. She had been staring at something near the window, but now her eyes flashed to his. She smiled a timid smile, still breathing a bit breathlessly. The two stared at each other for a long time before Alice broke the gaze, mumbling to herself, though at a volume Jasper could hear, "Let's check the closet."

She drifted away from the door, and over to the other closed door that led to a small closet. Alice opened it, and turned on the light. It flickered for a moment before it came to life. Alice started rummaging about even before the light had turned on completely.

Jasper raised his eyebrows. "Is there anything even in there?" he asked, taking his time as he traveled to the closet.

He heard a faint "mmhmm."

Alice popped out, startling him a bit. She was holding up a vintage black and white striped strapless dress. It looked like her perfect size, but the hemline worried Jasper; it came to mid thigh. They were going to clubs. His brow furrowed again. "What do you think?" Alice said perkily, taking Jasper from his thoughts of Alice and Edward or another man dancing provocatively in a foreign club.

He gave it once over quickly, and then said, "Yeah, I like it. But isn't it a bit short?"

Alice laughed. "You can be funny, Jasper," she said. But then caught herself again, and added, "Sometimes."

"Only sometimes?" he asked. Alice shrugged. She turned away quickly to get away from Jasper, to change, and also let him dig around in the closet for himself.

There really wasn't much there.

Jasper found a few T-shirts, a pair of jeans with ripped knees, some small dresses Bella had probably grown out of long before she moved here. _But why did she keep them? _Jasper wondered to himself as he shifted through the racks of either retro or vintage dresses.

Someone tapped his shoulder, distracting him. It was Alice of course. She was smiling like she did before he had screwed everything up with that kiss. She spun around, and shyly asked, "What do you think?"

It seemed when they were alone, Alice wasn't a siren out to get Edward. When they were alone, as they were now, they were friend with a connection again. It was confusing at first, and Jasper couldn't help but to speculate as to why it was this way suddenly with Alice. Then she snapped her fingers in front of his face, and looked to him, obviously expecting an answer. Again, Jasper had lost himself in his thoughts.

But he didn't need thoughts for this portion of the scene. He liked his instincts to talk.

He took her hand, and slowly spun her around, as if they were dancing at a ball for the rich. When he found her face again after her twirl, her smile was so wide, and her face was so different. Her appearance was the same, but there was something that was very different to Jasper. She looked more innocent. He'd never seen this Alice before. She was so different, and in the back of Jasper's mind, a place he often ignored, he concluded this was the way she was before she was diagnosed with schizophrenia. Before she went out with her sister's friends. Before she changed.

This Alice was even more beautiful to Jasper, he abashedly admitted to himself. She was always delicate, with her fragile paper bones and glass skin, but when she was like this, she was a sort of delicate that had a juvenile taste: the frailty of a child.

And Alice was always small as well. Her build was tiny. Jasper could wrap his fingers around her wrist twice. But now, she was not small because of her build, but because she was just a child, it seemed. She was so young, as her trimness was now due to that instead.

Also, Alice was always very innocent seeming. Her big blue eyes and miniature, smiling mouth added to her pure appearance. But now she was only looking naïve and innocent because she was like a child all over again when she appeared this way.

All of this was quite perplexing, but Jasper believed in change, so he saw how such a small occurrence, such as twirling for the fun of it like a child, could bring back a flood of childhood.

But in a fleeting second, of course, she was the same again. Her little mouth's corners were pulling up politely, and her blood-red lips opened into a grin that she couldn't seem to contain. Jasper had an urge just to lift his fingertips to her lips, and touch the spine-chilling, uncanny carmine color. It was a color that was not for lips, but for a rose. They were soft like tufts of cloud, but they were thin, not too plump, but not sharp in the least. They were perfect to Jasper. So he mumbled just that as Alice waited for a response: "You're perfect."

Her capriciousness did not allow Alice to keep her smile at a courtesy level. A beautiful grin burst through, and she blushed, looking to the ground. The color of cheeks when the blood flowed to them in humbleness was like her lips: beautiful, but like the color belonged to something even greater, making it seem amazing where it was.

"Thank you," she murmured, untwining her fingers from Jasper's, and wandered toward the other end of the room.

She plopped down on the bed. "What are you going to wear?" she asked, watching her feet, as they kicked up in the air, dangling just above the ground as she sat on the edge of the bed.

Jasper grabbed the ripped jeans and a plain white T-shirt. He held them up, and Alice observed them before shrugging her answer. She turned away, looking out the window and kicking her legs up, and Jasper changed into his new clothing. It was a bit tight, but it would do. When Alice turned back, she smiled, but said nothing.

She drifted to the door, and Jasper followed after her. She gravitated toward the open box of cigarettes on the counter. She lit herself one, and then looked up at Edward, who was looking through some papers at the foldout table. Without looking at him, she said, "We borrowed some clothes that were in the closet."

He glanced up at her once, and then back to his paper. "Okay," he said simply, shifting his gaze back and forth as he read something.

Bella, looking pallid and ashen, floated into the room. Jasper realized she walked the way Alice did, gliding, as if not touching the ground, but only Alice could make it seem like she was dancing.

Bella was wearing a simple red dress that reached to her knees, and had thin straps. It compared greatly with her colorless skin. Jasper could see her collarbone, but it was unhealthy looking, unlike Alice's.

She floated to Edward and draped her arm around his shoulders. Alice scowled.

Then Bella turned to look at Alice, as if she'd felt her scowl. Edward looked over as well. When Bella saw Alice, her eyes and mouth burst open, her face coming to life. Edward jumped up, and clamped her hand over her mouth. Jasper and Alice merely looked on, a bit taken aback and confused, but said nothing to them.

After a few moments, Edward let go, having said nothing to Bella. Bella did nothing, her expression back to sunken and bone-white. Her unhealthy papery fingers grasped Edward's, and they made their way to the door. Jasper and Alice followed.

Jasper watched Alice's fingers. They were spindly and had a sort of wispiness. Then he looked over at Bella's. They were unnaturally thin, not merely spindly. Bella's were unhealthy. Alice's were thin and white, but they had a sort of robustness.

Edward opened the door, and everyone walked out. Alice glanced provokingly at him as she flounced out, but he seemed to be trying to take no notice of that.

When Jasper stepped outside, the first thing he noticed was the biting frost of the air. What month was it? Because it was freezing outside! He wrapped his bare arms around himself, trying to retain a bit of body heat: even the tiniest bit would be helpful, it was so cold outside. He rubbed his arms, trying to create friction, and sighed. He could see his breathe. He sighed again; it was glacial outside.

Edward clapped his back. "It's suppose to snow tonight," he informed Jasper, looking on. Jasper couldn't tell if he was merely staring into space, watching Bella, or watching Alice.

"What are you looking at?" he asked.

Then Edward's eyes darted to the right, where Bella was waiting patiently, shivering a bit. Had he been looking at Alice, who was barely trembling at all, who seemed to not be noticing the cold weather altogether? Then he looked down. "Nothing."

Jasper nodded, and Edward walked forward to wrap his arms around Bella. He seemed distracted as he informed Alice and Jasper that Emmett's was down the street three blocks. They started walking that way, Alice closer to Edward than Jasper, resting into Edward whenever she could, claiming she was cold, even though she appeared to be bothered by the chilling wind at all.

Now, Jasper was completely confused. Something was wrong with Alice, but only when she was with Edward. When they were alone, she was absolutely normal. So something was definitely wrong. But what? She was acting different, and Jasper couldn't place his finger on it. But he swallowed his worry, and walked on through the biting coldness.

**Dudes. I want reviews. Do it.**


	7. Vanilla Twilight

**I know all of the past three chapters have had Owl City lyrics, but I couldn't resist one more:)**

**Thank you for the new reviews from last chapter, Cave In. Keep it up please! I need to know what I'm doing wrong or right; I need feedback!! So thank you and continue with it:))))**

_I watch the night turn light blue . . . But it's not the same without you . . . Because it takes two to whisper quietly . . . The silence isn't so bad . . . 'Till I look at my hands and feel sad . . . 'Cause the spaces between my fingers . . . Are right where yours fit perfectly . . ._

Jasper was lagging behind the group. He didn't really care though; Bella, Edward, nor Alice were noticing, and he wasn't either, really, because he was distracted; couldn't help staring at the burns on the back of Bella's shivering arms. He knew the blistering ones were from that morning when she had fallen back on the stove that was being used to cook pancakes, and burned herself. But there was an array of other burns, scars, bruises, and scabbing injuries that Jasper couldn't find the meaning of.

The cigarette burns were easy to distinguish: they were perfectly round and red. But what Jasper was really interested in was if they were self-inflicted or a mistake of someone else.

Bella was a very complex, quiet, secretive, sometimes mysterious, and seemingly damaging person, from what Jasper had seen of in the past couple of hours. It was entirely possibly Bella had maybe taken a little too many of her daily, but unnecessary, painkillers, which drove her mad, causing her to hurt herself with one of the cigarettes and lighters Edward left lying around his apartment.

But, it could easily be the fault of someone else, say, perhaps Edward. He was always smoking. One night he could have been drunk, drugged, high, leaned down to kiss, unconscious of the cigarettes dangling from his mouth, and instead burned her. Or perhaps, it was one of her friends. From what Jasper could remember of the previous night when he and Alice had first come to his apartment – when everything had been normal. How drastically things seemed to have changed – everyone had been insanely drunk, drugged, or high. Jasper wouldn't be surprised if one of them had burned her on accident one Friday night.

Also scaling Bella's skin was a collection of scars. White lines, twisted or straight, sliced across her skin; deadly injuries healed. They were all white like her skin – though her skin was much more yellow than the scars, allowing the scars to even be seen – and bumpy, raised skin. They looked like they had once been painful, once been bleeding and so harmful that they had to leave behind a pasty white mark to remind her of the raw, throbbing feeling of their pain.

Those could have been caused by anything at all, ranging from herself, to ant of her friends, to just an accident that could have been avoidable, but was not, in her case. Jasper didn't give much time in thinking about the scars, though they looked menacing enough.

There was also quite a large arrangement of bruises in various stages of healing: yellow, black, and even blue. They were all alarmingly outsized, and Jasper had to wonder how contusions so large could come about. Self-inflicted? A form of abuse? It couldn't be mere accidents that caused these. They were too big to just have been "Oops, I bumped into the doorknob" situations. There was a story behind each large contusion, and Jasper burned to know them all.

Bella also had quite a number of cuts and scabs. None were opened, but some looked freshly scabbed over. Some, Jasper imagined, would become scars along with the others; they looked so old and ready to flake of and show of its new raised, whitish skin. But most looked like they had come about in the past couple of days! They were a fresh red color, and not pruned yet. Could any of them have happened today? Jasper wondered what Bella _had_ been doing that day other than play cards with him for a bit. Cutting herself? But why the back of her arms? That was certainly peculiar of anyone, even someone worried about cutting.

"Here," someone said.

Jasper lifted his eyes from Bella's injured arms, and looked around, analyzing where exactly he was.

The streets and apartments looked no different from the ones near where Edward lived: edifices made up of dirty, aging bricks and annoying, uncontrollable vines. Garbage littering the streets, as if it were not actually considered a crime nowadays. Pets – mangy dogs and scraggly, threadbare cats – hid in the narrow alleys between the buildings, they're eyes glowing in the shadows eerily, following everyone's movement, not daring to move themselves. No cars whizzing down the streets. No streetlights, allowing the fading sun to be their only source of any light. It was almost identical to Edward's block.

A gust of wind blew through the streets, and Jasper remembered how absolutely icy it was this evening. Jasper thought to himself for a moment he could possibly taste the coming snow on his tongue as the wind blew past him, but brushed it off. He knew it was supposed to snow though, and wrapped his arms around himself.

Then he slipped closer to Alice.

"Hi," he greeted her, shivering. He looked her up and down once. "How come you're not freezing? Your wearing a strapless dress and it's going to snow tonight."

Alice looked to him fleetingly. They were alone. Edward had gone up to the door to speak to Emmett through the intercom, and presumably, Bella had followed. Alice and Jasper remained alone, waiting, on the stone steps leading to the apartment building. She was resisting the urge to completely normal and friendly with Jasper every second, but was doing pretty good with keeping her composure.

Alice stared straight as she answered simply, "I am cold."

"You don't seem to be."

"Well, I am."

"You're not shivering. I think it's cold enough outside to shiver. Edward and Bella are shivering."

"I know. But I don't shiver when I'm cold."

"I have goosebumps. It has to be cold enough outside to have goosebumps on your arms as well, right?" Then Jasper stole a glance at Alice's thin arms that were dangling limply at her sides. "Though _you_ have none, it seems."

"I do too!"

Jasper glanced again, and pointed. "You don't."

"I do. They're just very, very small."

"Microscopic?"

Alice smiled, giggled a bit, but still did not look up at Jasper, something he was hoping for. "Yeah."

"You're smiling." Jasper smiled. He was still hoping this would at least make her glance at him.

She merely shrugged. "Yeah."

"Okay, we're in, let's go. Stop flirting over there, and get your butts in gear," Edward shouted as he yanked the door open, Bella gliding through, but he still held it for them.

Jasper and Alice scampered over, and through the door, into a room that was cold as it was outside.

"It's freezing," Jasper noted.

Edward shrugged. "They don't have a heater in this crappy old building," he replied as he grinned his signature smirk. Jasper rolled his eyes, and walked past him to the elevators. Everyone followed, and they piled in. Edward pressed the button, and they slowly creaked their way up in complete frost to the fifth floor.

They stepped out one the rusty doors were open, and Edward led the way down to the very last door to the left of the elevator, all the way to apartment number fifty-nine, whose front door was already slightly ajar, revealing a thin sliver of light from the room beyond it.

Edward swung the door open, letting it hit the wall with a full impact, literally bursting into the room. Emmett and Rosalie both looked up from where they had been occupied – Emmett with a beer on a floral couch, Rosalie in front of a mirror near a door that possibly led to either their kitchen or their bedroom.

Bella floated over to Rosalie, wordlessly, of course, and Jasper heard the following hushed dialogue exchanged between the two girls as soon as she got over there:

Rosalie: "You want any of your painkillers? You like you might need a few, honey."

Bella, shaking her head: "No, I took four before we came over. They're not really doing anything yet though."

Rosalie: "Four? And nothing? That's odd. Maybe you should take some more, just in case . . . "

Bella, shaking her head again: "No, it's fine."

Rosalie, shrugs, walks away over to the couch where Edward and Alice had collected around Emmett. She flashed her eyes towards Jasper once, where he got the chance to properly assess her . . .

She was, essentially, quite beautiful. She had flowing blonde hair, the sort every fake blonde wished she could achieve but never could: it was strictly natural, the genetic lottery winner. She also had beautiful, cerulean eyes, though the color was hard to see, her pupils were quite dilated. But that was another rare genetic combo: blue eyes and blonde hair. She also had clear fair skin and a lean body, two more advantages.

So Rosalie was rather beautiful, but she wore quite an amount of makeup, smothering her natural beauty.

Eyeliner rimmed her eyes excessively; it was thick and black, wrapping around her whole eye, making her appear to be a trashy doll. She had bright pink eyeshadow that reached to her brows, and flared outward, riding on the tail of her eyeliner. She also had fake lashes in, and mascara on her real ones, that his in the pockets of the fakes. Blush the color of her eyeshadow smeared into the skin of her cheekbones, flickering upward with the eyeliner and eyeshadow. And then her lips; lips that, without that trashy shade, would have been most likely a beautiful shade of red, glossy and perfect, though not touching the color of Alice's. But they were coated with the same color of her blush and eyeshadow: bright, hot pink. It was ugly. When one had so much beauty, why did they feel such a need to shroud it in such ugly product? It was astounding to Jasper.

And her perfectly lean body was completely ruined by her outfit: black booty shorts that did not hug, but instead grabbed onto her crotch and butt. As her strapless pink tub top did as well: enveloped her body crushingly, and refused to let go.

When she had waltzed, swaying her hips an attempt to be seductive, Jasper supposed, over to the group by the sofa, she then did something that confirmed Rosalie's insecurity: she plopped down on Emmett's lap, wrapping her arms around his shoulders, and gave him a huge smooch right in front of everyone. Jasper's mouth twisted in a shape that read disgusted. Everyone else merely laughed though, Edward elbowed his arm as well. Even Bella cracked something that resembled a smile, but Jasper couldn't be completely sure of that.

Then the heads swiveled. Emmett yelped, "Jasper! I haven't seen you since you where, what, thirteen? Come over here!"

Jasper ambled over, the corners of his lips pulling up just a bit, showing a tiny smile. "I saw you last night, remember?" Jasper said as he and Emmett bumped their knuckles.

Emmett pressed his thick black eyebrows down on his black, glittering, dilated eyes. "Really? Did you come to visit Cousin Edward? Was I even over there . . . last night?" He turned to Rosalie who smiled and nodded. Emmett shrugged. "So why are you here anyway. And who's this kid?" He jerked his thumb at Alice.

Jasper smiled a bit more. "Well, I was going to check myself into St. Paul's, but I met Alice –" he gestured to her "– on the way there, and we sort of got sidetracked. I knew Edward was out here, and neither of us had a place to go. So, we crashed with him."

"And last night was Friday?" Jasper nodded. "Oh. Well hey there then, it's good to see you, kiddo! You're, like, fifteen now though, so I guess you're not a kiddo anymore . . ."

"I'm seventeen."

"And it's a pleasure to meet your girly here, Alice." He smiled at her, and politely shook her hand.

"Well are we gonna go or what?" Rosalie exclaimed, jumping from Emmett's lap. She had a broad smile on, but it all seemed so fake. "I wanna hit the clubs!" she whined.

Emmett got up, and draped his arm around her loosely. "We're going, we're going. Let's move out."

So everyone sauntered to the door, down the elevator, and out into the darkness evening had become, buzzing with excitement, ready for the night to actually begin. But that's where everyone became snagged, and a quick argument ensued.

"Brooklyn is miles from here!" Edward countered. "_And_ it's freezing. We cannot walk."

"But we have _no money_!" Emmett shouted back. Jasper saw a bluish vein pulse in his reddening neck as he raised his voice. "We have to walk, there is no other option!"

"I have money," someone offered. Everyone's heads whipped around to the voice, finding Bella.

"You have money, Bella?" Edward asked, perplexed.

She paused. "_No_! I did, but I spent it on my painkillers! See, I took it from the Tanhs when I was cleaning their house Friday. It was a four twenties, just sitting there. I had to take it. No one caught me! And they obviously haven't noticed yet. But it was something extra I could keep in handy in case I needed it; I promised myself I wouldn't blow it on my painkillers, but I did! I couldn't help it. When I was out there, he gave me a special deal, and I couldn't refuse! I'm sorry! I should have kept it! I'm so sorry!" Bella said, the words running together. Jasper had to listen carefully to catch everything, especially because she was keeping her voice quite low. It was the most he'd ever heard her say.

Edward shrugged. "Bella, it's fine, I have an idea. How about we just jump it, get on? No one will care. No one around here takes the subway because no one in this neighborhood had any money. It'll be fine; I've done it before. Just jump it."

Emmett gritted his teeth, and glared at Edward, and mumbled, "Fine." He then turned sharply, and started walking toward the closest subway entrance. Rosalie pranced beside him, whispering something. Bella kept her head down, and Jasper could not see her face. Edward came to her, and embraced her, pulling her close to him, her fallen head buried into his chest. Jasper was fairly sure he heard faint sobs, but tried not to listen.

So that left just Alice and Jasper to meander after Emmett and Rosalie, who looked like they were sharing a somewhat sentimental couple moment as well.

"I hope Bella is all right. That was the most I've ever heard her speak. I wonder if it scared her or something," Alice remarked, glancing back at Bella and Edward, who were stationary in the middle of the road behind them, Edward still holding Bella.

"I'm worried for her too. She seems especially unstable tonight," Jasper agreed.

"I've always wondered what her secret 'painkiller' was. It's got to be strong, huh? I'm curious. They never name it, you know?" Alice kicked at the gravel with her shoe.

"I've been wondering that as well, but I don't know if we should ask them _or_ Bella about it. It's obviously important to her, and secretive, if no one is actually naming it."

"I suppose . . ."

"Hurry up, losers, or we'll miss the subway!" Emmett called from the stairwell that led underground.

Jasper heard Edward and Bella running behind them, and decided to so as well. Alice was ahead of him though; she had already taken off. So Jasper just followed.

Everyone ran down the stairs. No one but Edward had experience with jumping onto a subway without paying, but everyone's instincts were saying the same things: "Run. Be fast. Never slow. You'll be caught. Run. Be fast. Don't be slow, and you won't be caught."

So no one slowed. Everyone ran full speed into the deserted station, darting around toward the cranks that blocked the people who couldn't pay from the subway. Jasper could hear it roar in the walls. It was coming. They had to quick. So he ran ahead, after Edward, and jumped over a post. Everyone else followed.

Then the train roared in, shaking the station. No one was on it. The group sprinted over to it, determined to catch it before caught or before the subway closed its doors on them.

Everyone leaped on right as the doors closed.

High-fives and knuckle bumps were passed around, everyone proud of everyone for making it just in time. Only Bella seemed detached from this merriment and satisfaction. But Edward wrapped his arms around her waist, and she somehow seemed a little better.

So now they had to wait until they found Brooklyn. They were in the clear now, the adrenaline of almost being caught pumping through each one of their veins, perfect for a club scene. So naturally, Jasper was a bit guilty of being excited for that night.

**YAY!**

**I've always kind of wanted to do that . . . but I live where there aren't any subways, so that that's too bad :(**

**So review. Keep up with those wonderful reviews from Cave In, I really appreciated those:) Thank you guys!**


	8. House of Cards

**Yay! An important and LOOONG chapter :DDD**

**Okay, I know the last one was slow, but it's about to get a whole lot more interesting after this chapter:)**

_I don't wanna be your friend . . . I just wanna be your lover . . . No matter how it ends . . . No matter how it starts . . ._

The subway rushed down the tunnel, pounding down on Edward's, Alice's, Rosalie's, Emmett's, and Jasper's eardrums, as they were the only ones in the train. The doors had closed so swiftly, the train starting so suddenly, they had all toppled down onto the worn pleather seats, landing on top of everyone, and now they were trying to detangle themselves, ignoring the blast of the subway.

Eventually, seats were decided.

Emmett and Rosalie – a couple that, Jasper assessed, was in the early, "honeymoon" phase of their relationship – decided to share a strap that hung from the top of car, that way they could snuggle close to each other, nuzzling their noses, whispering in each other's ears. It was endearing in a way, but also a little too much P.D.A. Jasper just insisted they were all friends; it was okay.

Bella had decided on the closest seat, the one beside the door, immediately. Edward took his place beside her, placing her arm on her shoulders in reassurance, as she was shaking. Alice was quick to sit in the next seat, leaning into Edward, batting her eyelashes, waiting for him to redirect his indirect stare to her.

And Jasper had just decided to sit beside Alice. But she had barely noticed this.

Things remained this way as they waited for the car to shuttle all the way into Brooklyn. It was a long ride, and it remained fairly empty throughout. If one person got on, they usually gave Jasper's crowd a strange look, sat the as far away as they could, and then departed swiftly the next time the car came to a stop, at the door before they even opened. Jasper didn't mind these people, they were usually businessmen and businesswomen heading home after a long day of work; something he could tell by the black pleated trousers and pencil skirts. And he could understand why this crowd he was somehow part of seemed odd to them: two couples – one consisting of a football player-esque boy and a Harajuku-esque girl, the other consisting of a cocky bronze-haired boy and sickly, pallid girl who looked like she was on the brink of insanity – and then two lone others: a beautiful girl and just a boy. It would be odd to anyone, Jasper figured to himself as the car shuttled along, so he wasn't offended by the peculiar looks and glances often thrown at them by other passengers who were unlucky enough to decide on that train.

Finally, the subway came to the stop they were looking for in Brooklyn. Edward announced it immediately, as he was the only who was making it known he was watching; Jasper had been watching the stops as well, though he said nothing when it was their stop.

Everyone filed into the somewhat crowded station. Only a few people got in once the group had gotten off.

Edward led the group through the throng of frazzled, disheveled mothers holding their sticky, oblivious children, the businessmen and businesswomen preoccupied with their Blackberries, and the lone, high teenagers waiting for it to wear off so they would know where to go or even what to do next.

Once everyone had made it through and was above ground, Edward asked Emmett for directions; only Emmett seemed to know where this mysterious club was with this mysterious underground band he was supposedly excited to see.

So Edward passed his leadership onto Emmett when Emmett instructed everyone to follow him down the streets of Brooklyn.

The farther down a certain street the group traveled, the louder, boozier the brick buildings around them became. Assorted men and women were stumbling around, drunk, falling down on the concrete, laughing hysterically, were found much easier the closer everyone got to their mysterious destination. Music, screams, and frantic laughter became heavier against Jasper's eardrums as they continued to travel into the depths of this lone Brooklyn street.

Finally, they all arrived at the epitome of the loud and obnoxious street: a bar called The Sewer. Just the name sounded repulsing, but everyone else seemed so excited, even eager, to go in, though Jasper couldn't really find the appeal of the place.

It was like anyone's typical bar: live music pulsed outward, scaring any unsuspecting pedestrian passing by. Drunkards were stumbling about, trying to find their way down the street through their foggy, blurred, drunken vision. The only thing that really made this particular bar stand out was how much more disgusting this one was; garbage lined the sidewalk that passed in front of it. Spilled beer and other liquids (perhaps even a bodily fluid Jasper didn't really want to think about) were splashed across the concrete. The two smells mingled together, creating a combined scent that was utterly revolting. It made Jasper's eyes water.

But no one, not even Alice, who had never even _seen_ a bar, much less stepped foot in one, seemed as disgusted as Jasper was. But maybe Jasper was just being a pansy. If Alice could hold her nose and follow Emmett and Edward in, so could Jasper.

So Jasper plugged his nose with his fingers, fought through the water that was collecting in his eyes due to the nauseating odor of the bar, and stepped through the door, and into The Sewer that turned out to be only as trashed-out on the inside as it was on the outside.

There was a long bar to the left of the door, a bar no one could miss, perhaps even if they were blind: the smell of booze, marijuana and cigarette smoke of the saloon-esque area was so strong that it could wake the dead. Jasper didn't dare unplug his nose again.

To the right was a dingy white wall, and two equally dingy doors, one with a women's sign, and one with a men's sign, obviously the bathrooms. No one wanted to know what that smelled like though; even the way it looked with its stained wall and rusty doorknobs was enough to keep you away from that area of The Sewer.

Straight ahead was an array of tables and chairs, some occupied by drunken slops, some not. Beyond that was a small stage where a man with a guitar and an angry face was rocking out, different color lighting streaking across his face as he sang a loud song about lost love.

And in the middle of all the tables and directly in front of the stage was a packed dance floor. And it wasn't _just_ a dance floor. It was one of those old tacky ones one could find in an old 80's movie; yes, the type with color changing tiles. The only problem was this one did not have a huge, spinning disco ball above. Instead, it had strobe lights, similar to the ones up above the small stage.

On this tacky dance floor, tons of people were grinding and dancing to the live music. Jasper was surprised at the types of people he saw; there were naturally beautiful women with tiny, transparent dresses, whose thongs were obvious under the bright strobe lights. There were scummy men who had been perverts all their lives wearing tacky suits, who were dancing with these beautiful women who deserved much more. There were also regular sluts, who normally wouldn't have looked somewhat decent without the despicable amount of makeup they were wearing and their tiny, braless tube tops and mini-skirts. They resembled Rosalie, and she fit right in with them, though she had more natural beauty than all of them combined. And there were also just normal people you thought you'd seen before on the streets who were smashingly drunk, trying to get laid.

It was quite a crowd, and Jasper didn't know where he quite fit in. Everyone else had already found their stereotype to hang with. So, Jasper drifted over to the bar, ordered a drink, and then sat down at one of the tables, alone, watching everyone else.

Alice, Edward, Emmett, and Rosalie had all fit in quite well on the dance floor, even without being a touch drunk. Emmett and Rosalie were grinding on each other in a flash, a ghastly sight in Jasper's opinion, and Alice and Edward were merely dancing together, at least a foot between them, something Jasper definitely approved of.

Jasper really didn't mind being the outsider looking in. He figured after a drink or two, he'd be fit to go out on the dance floor himself, and slide right in between Alice and Edward.

"Hey, Jasper," someone said. The sound resembled a whisper, but it wasn't quite one completely. It was still hard to hear over the pulsing music though.

Jasper turned, and found himself staring up at the ever ashen Bella, as she fiddled with her open beer bottle. She was looking down at it, watching the liquid swish within. "Do you mind if I sit?" she added.

Jasper shook his head, saying, "No, no, go ahead." He offered her the seat beside him.

Bella sat, placing her beer on the table, and looked down at her hands. She wasn't much a one for conversation, so Jasper didn't try to prod, and merely looked on at the dance floor.

But Bella seemed to be interested in a little conversation, something that surprised Jasper at first. "It's so loud," she remarked as she began to twiddle her thumbs.

Jasper shrugged, and sipped his drink. "I suppose. But clubs are always loud. Have you ever been to club?"

Bella ran her pointer finger around the rim of her bottle that she had yet to drink out of. Then she nodded, and said after a pause, "I've been to many with Edward, Emmett, and Rosalie, but I never dance. They always tell me this is the time I have to come dance with them, but I never do, and they don't really care. I just don't fit in with any people in that dancing crowd." She cast a longing glance toward the dance floor, but then readjusted her gaze to her untouched bottle again.

"Do you want to go dance?"

"Are you _asking_ me to dance?"

Jasper paused, then looked into her eyes briefly, and chuckled. "No, I was just wondering . . . do you secretly want to go dance with all of them? Feel like you fit in and what not?"

Bella gave him a strange glance. It was mixture of curiosity, her usual bleakness, and the deepest regret. And then she took a huge swig from the beer bottle she was clutching with bone-white knuckles. Then she gave a curt laugh. "I'm a really cheap drunk you know. A couple more of these, and I'll be totally smashed."

Jasper eyed her suspiciously, but brushed it off, and took a sip of his own beer. By the time he had finished that one sip, Bella was already ordering a round of shots that had to Jasper declined to. So when they arrived at the table, Bella drank all of them, leaving Jasper quite worried for her. When Bella tried to wave the waitress over again, he distracted her, by asking the question, "So you never told me: do you really want to go dance over there, with Edward and all them?"

Jasper pointed to the crowd without looking. Then Bella looked over, and the second she did, her mouth dropped, and her drunken eyes popped open. She was obviously shocked, so Jasper had to look over into the crowd as well, where he saw this scene:

Alice, grinding on Edward. Edward, kissing her neck, feeling her breasts. Alice looking happy, smiling. And then they glanced over to Jasper and Bella in a lapse of kismet.

Edward and Alice's faces melted from drunken, horny happiness into guilt and culpability simultaneously.

And Jasper and Bella's faces quickly turned, in unison, from shocked and confounded to the strongest sort of anger.

And all four seemed to stare at each other for a perpetual amount of time, those expressions remaining plastered on each of their faces as they analyzed their true counterpart.

Jasper was looking to Alice, disappointed, Alice returning the gaze, beautifully shamefaced. And they just looked into each other eyes, no words were necessary in this situation; this silence contained every word the two wanted to hurl at the other.

Edward and Bella looked at each other in the same way, but it seemed backwards; Bella was finally taken control of Edward, when it was usually the other way around. Bella was the one scolding for once, not the other way around. And Edward was absolutely accountable, and guilty about it. He knew Bella was dismayed enough with everything that was happening and had happened in her life; this almost cheating of his was going to cause a lot of anxiety and tension between them now, and Edward felt so guilty for it. _How could you?_ was all he could think to himself as he stared shamefully into Bella's furiously blazing – an emotion of hers he had not seen in quite a long time – but beautiful brown eyes.

This staring contest lasted for a long time. Jasper and Bella felt betrayed, and very drunk. Alice and Edward felt only shameful, and a bit of leftover horniness. But what could have happened next that caused Jasper and Alice's lives to change so much?

"You know, that's my dress," Bella slurred through her grinding teeth. She was obviously quite drunk from the beer and shots, so her words were not clear. "I was going to say something, but Edward wouldn't let me. He covered my mouth so I couldn't say anything."

It took Jasper more than a moment to decipher Bella's drunken, muffled slur, but once he had, he told her this with a spiteful edge to his voice, "You should get your dress back."

Bella looked up at Jasper, her brow furrowing. Jasper did not look back at her though. "What?" she asked, as if she had not understood a word he had said to her.

"Go get it back!" Jasper explained slowly. "It's your dress. And you deserve it. Alice has done enough betraying tonight, no? Maybe you should punish her for her bad conduct by taking your dress back. You let her borrow it, and now she has soiled it with her . . . disloyalty. Go get your dress back to teach her a well-deserved lesson."

Bella continued to stare up at Jasper for a minute or two while the intoxicated screws and cogs and knuts and bolts inside her head put the pieces together. Alice and Edward waited anxiously on the edge of the dance floor, a safe distance apart.

Finally, Bella came to a conclusion, and rose from their table. Her swagger was rather sloppy because she was drunk, but she definitely had a sensible plan up ahead.

She approached Edward and Alice. Alice was looking down at her feet, her hands clasped in front of her belly. Edward opened her mouth once, and then shut it, waiting nobly for Bella's scolding. But instead, Bella turned to face Alice, and waited for her to look up again. When Alice realized Bella was watching _her_, not Edward, she looked up again, and the first thing she got was a slap across the face from Bella.

"_Whore!_" Bella cried. She sounded like she was crying, but Jasper could not see her face. "That's _my_ fucked up almost lover –" she stabbed a finger at Edward, who looked taken aback by her abrasive statement about him, "– and that's_ my fucking dress_!"

Jasper was a bit proud that he was sort of the mastermind behind this. He swallowed his last swig of beer, and told the waitress to bring a round of shots. This deserved some celebration, didn't it?

Jasper wasn't usually this sort of vengeful person. But when he saw Alice enjoying Edward's betraying supple lips upon her creamy skin, his disloyal hands upon her breasts . . . everything seemed to crumble, including his judgment and sensibility. Jasper's world was suddenly changed when he caught Alice red-handed. Gravity was pulling him down now, and he was slammed down to earth. Now, he was not invincible.

Jasper's smirk of pride vanished. He realized now that . . . that Alice had kept him from floating off into the unknown like he use to, it was not gravity. But now that she had seemed to betray him, gravity _was_ crushing him into the earth, mashing him into the ground. And Alice was the one who had made him invincible; she found no fault in him. But now, he was a mortal, bound to die at any second.

The waitress brought the celebratory shots. But Jasper pushed them away, suddenly feeling sick to his stomach.

And then he heard a shriek.

He instinctively looked over to Bella, Edward, and Alice, who the rest of the club had collected around, as soon as he heard it. And then he saw the very reason for the screech.

Bella had launched herself at Alice, ripping away at the dress. The crowd that had gathered around them was now gasping, backing away. Edward was momentarily shocked to the point, where, he could not do anything. But he soon snapped out of it, and effortlessly pulled Bella away from Alice, but not before she had completely mutilated the dress, holding the remaining shreds in her fists as if they were trophies.

Alice was lying on the dusty floor, as shocked as everyone else. Her dress was shredded, and of course, there was nothing under. Bella was laughing and pointing at her hysterically as Alice lay there, completely motionless. Edward was wide-eyed, but looked away. The rest of crowd took in another communal gasp.

The spotlight spilled over Alice, casting a silvery light over her body, exposing it. All of it. She was not wearing any undergarments. Yet, her expression did not change until she lifted her head, and saw her uncovered body. She then leapt up, her appearance obviously horrified.

She ran out of that bar, as fast as a bullet, as quickly as she possibly could. Everyone left was abandoned, left to gossip and murmur about what had just happened to the poor girl.

Jasper and Edward then exchanged a glance. Jasper's was glassy and unreadable, but Edward's said he was going to take Bella out back and talk to her. And sure enough, Edward, who was holding Bella around the waist, her feet suspended about a foot and half above ground, swung her around, and began to walk toward the back, still holding onto her.

Jasper wasn't sure what to do next.

Go after Alice? Apologize?

Or let her cool off outside? Maybe she needed some time to herself before she could see him.

And then Jasper realized he was tired of it. He was always questioning himself and his future. He was always torn. But for Alice, he couldn't be. She relied on her instincts, so why couldn't _he_? It obviously had made some bad choices for her, but just the fact that she did it anyway, whether it was to be a bad outcome or not, made her brave and headstrong. If he were to ever go anywhere with Alice, he needed to trust himself as much she trusted _herself_. No second guessing anymore.

So Jasper did just what his instincts told him, and followed Alice right out that door.

"_Alice! Alice! Alice, where are you?!_" Jasper yelled as he burst outside, determination ringing in his voice. He was a man on a mission; the sound of his voice was enough to see that.

Then Jasper heard a crunch beneath his feet.

So he looked down in confusion, and saw snow.

Yes, snow, the white stuff. It was laying across the streets and sidewalks, covering the garbage that cluttered the area, icing the roads, creating icicles that dripped from The Sewer's awning.

And snow was drifting from the sky, twinkling in the deep black night sky. And for once, they were _snowflakes_; not the clumps they usually are. They were dainty, and fell from the sky like pieces of star and moon, gliding until they found their destination.

Jasper watched a single flake, a beautiful flake, drift down from the top of the sky. It swayed left to right, shaken by the wind. But he was strong, and he was determined to go down as straightly as he could, so he could land on the perfect target: a half-naked girl's spiky black hair. She was standing in the street, white fluff landing on her expertly.

Jasper grinned, relief washing through his system.

Alice's expression was blank, but she looked just like a true snow angel: beautiful as ever. Her spiky black hair was blanketed with snow, but the spikes were poking through the tufts. Her pale, exposed skin was as white as the snow, and shone fantasmically beneath the full moon. And her blue eyes could put any sky to shame; maybe that was why the night was so black that evening. Her red lips were plump and supple, the color jumping from her white skin. Her limbs were lithe and dancing even when they were stationary. She was not shivering.

She was perfect. She was all he needed.

"Alice," Jasper murmured.

**Okay, guys, reviews please? This was an important chapter and I want to know what you thought of it! Feedback is my obsession, and you guys are slowly killing me with your silence.**


	9. Nude

**Seriously, if you listen to Nude by Radiohead during the *hem, hem* part when Jasper and Alice *hem, hem* go home together (**_**lips locked . . . shut up!**_**), the whole scene will seem so much better:)**

**So why don't I have a song for this chapter? Because if I used Nude, the lyrics would put you off a bit :/**

**Why not any other song? Because none, I swear **_**none**_**, of the other songs I've considered could compare and bring the same level of emotion, as I wanted the song I chose to. None even held a fucking candle. So, we're left song-less for this chapter though I'm still titling it **_**Nude**_** so everyone will the idea that **_**I REALLY, REALLY WANT THEM TO LISTEN TO THE SONG NUDE BY RADIOHEAD ON REPEAT WHILE READING THE *SPOILER* LEMON**_**! So just do it, okay? Please? Thank you!**

**K, here you are:**

"Jasper." Alice's voice sounded so soft and fragile. "I knew you were coming."

"A vision?"

"Yeah."

It was cold outside, and Alice was bare except for a few strips of the dress Bella had torn from her that striped her body. For once, Alice was shivering; she never shivered. But she was not sure if it was because it was cold outside or for another reason.

Alice and Jasper held each other's gaze for a while. Alice liked his eye color; it was a strong color, nearly gold, but it was soft in demeanor. The color made her crack the tiniest smile, though Jasper appeared not to have detected that movement at all.

She continued to watch the coloring to distract herself. Alice was like a small child in that every second that past by was like eternity for her. She had no patience. The silence between Jasper and her was slowing killing her, eating away at her sanity and concentration. She hated silence. A lack of words was like a lack of oxygen to Alice.

But she couldn't say anything. She had nothing to say to him.

Alice fidgeted when a sudden gust of frigid wind swept through the streets and over her bare skin.

What could she say to him? Nothing.

The snow was piling up at her feet and on her skins and in her hair. This was_ real_ snow, not _clumps_ of snow, Alice noticed. There were actual snowflakes, beautiful and unique, swaying in the frosty air.

She caught one unintentionally. It landed in her upturned, open palm, and stayed there. It had a magnificent pattern and it was very beautiful. Alice found herself wanting to keep it. It was just so gorgeous and unique. It didn't have any flaws at all. It was perfect.

But then it melted, Alice's body heat causing it to dissolve quickly into water. The intricately woven pattern was gone; the beauty and uniqueness of Snowflake was gone; now, it was just one big flaw instead of the epitome of flawlessness.

She marveled at how quickly things changed. Perfect changed to unwanted. Beauty changed to error. Wondrous turned to defect. And it all happened in a second out of the life of Alice and Snowflake. So quickly had she turned from ice turned to just . . . _water._

What, ask him for an apology? Tell him it was Edward's fault? There was honestly nothing left to tell him.

Alice rubbed her palm to one of the remaining shreds of the dress she had been wearing. She wiped it across, killing the last of Snowflake, ridding her palm of the water that had once been ice.

She looked at Jasper, her eyes filled with ingenuous expectation. Jasper stared back blankly.

These passing seconds that were lasting perpetually were really starting to dismay Alice. _Just say something_, she pleaded in her mind with herself and Jasper. _Break this damn silence._

Her plea was answered.

"You're shivering," Jasper said simply, stuffing his hands into his pockets for heat. Alice longed to do the mimic the action; if only she was wearing the rest of her clothing. She'd be somewhat warm and drunken people would stop hooting at her.

"I told you I shiver," Alice replied, her voice calm and subtle, not snapping like the comment meant for her voice to be.

"I didn't believe you." He grinned crookedly, and Alice's heart fluttered, which she tried her best to suppress; she was sure he could see it leaping from her ribcage.

"Well you must now."

"I do."

More agonizingly silent seconds of ceaselessness? What was Jasper trying to do, murder her with wordlessness so he wouldn't have to see her betraying face ever again? _Fuck_!

Then Alice realized she had said all of that out loud.

Jasper chuckled, cupping his chin with one hand. "What a vocabulary, Alice!" he joked.

Alice rolled her eyes, and rubbed her palms up and down her arms to create friction that could possibly keep her from freezing to death. "Thanks," she mumbled as she rubbed.

Jasper approached her, taking a coat he had been hiding behind him. He draped it across her shoulders, and she greedily snatched the sides, closing the whole article of clothing around her. She instantly felt warmer, happier. She smiled, but then her forehead creased. "Whose jacket is this? I don't remember anyone we know bringing a jacket . . ."

Jasper laughed, and turned around her in order to face her. "I grabbed it of a hook, thinking you were probably freezing out here."

"That was smart, Jasper, but shouldn't we return the jacket? It's not ours, and someone else will be needing it soon, too." Worry lines folded in Alice's pale forehead.

He smiled. "But you're not wearing anything. I think that evens the odds a little bit, don't you?"

She blushed, warming her cheeks.

Then Jasper's eyes became serious, and his smile vanished. Alice's forehead pleated again. Jasper took her hands from her coat, exposing her to the cold again, but she didn't mind; Jasper's touch was electrifying enough to get her through the glacial weather.

Jasper held her bluing fingers in his. The contrast was amazing; his were so big and rough, dotted with many calluses. But Alice's were small, dainty, and white, like a china doll's. Jasper could wrap his fingers around hers fully at least three times and still have a bit left over, Alice reasoned with herself as she looked at their linked fingers. But then she looked back up at Jasper, and saw the intensity had not left.

Alice stared back, encouraging him to say whatever he needed to.

Jasper sighed, shifting his fingers around hers, playing with them. He was watching them instead of her when he murmured tenderly, "What do you want me to say?"

Alice looked into his eyes, though he was not looking back. She could feel the rawness of concern wavering in her blue irises, and she did nothing to stifle it. She then murmured back, her voice scratchy and hoarse, "Well, what do you feel like saying to me?"

He still did not look up. "That I'm sorry."

A slight smile broke itself onto Alice's lips, but Jasper still did not look up. "Sorry? What for?"

"It was my fault that Bella ripped up your dress. I told her to go over and 'take it back' because she told me that was her dress." Jasper sighed, and started to play with her fingers again.

Alice was not feeling spiteful at all as she watched him play her fingers as if they were the keys of a piano. She didn't mind that Jasper was averting her gaze, or that she half naked, or that she could get frostbite any minute now, or that there was some random drunk man yelling over at her to give him a lap dance in the background. She didn't mind any of it because her fingers were being toyed with by one of the most amazing people Alice had ever met, keeping them as warm as ever.

But Alice broke the silence of course; _out of curiosity, of course_, she would tell herself, even though she knew that wasn't the true reason. "Why?" she asked softly.

Jasper froze for a minute, his fingers remaining hovered over Alice's, not moving, not shaking, not _doing_ anything. Then they suddenly became animated once more as he sighed, and murmured, "I told her to go over and do that because I was . . . I was just . . ."

"Jealous?" Alice finished for him, still smiling.

He finally looked up at her. Alice was momentarily stunned by his expression: his eyes read worn and ragged, but his smile was slight and teasing. "Yeah," he replied, his voice breaking.

Alice's smiled was now wider and sultry, though she wasn't aware of this really. But Jasper was, and it was making his hands a little slick. "So _you_ were _jealous_?" she asked, her eyes playfully seductive.

He shrugged, and played with her fingers again, but did not look away. "Yeah, I suppose I was."

Alice shook her head slightly, curiosity and confusion fooling around with her mind and words. "Why though? Why were so jealous of Edward? I thought you said nothing was going on between us. Remember? After the kiss; you said 'nothing is'." There was an air of distress pressing down on Alice's voice, but both she and Jasper tried to ignore this.

"I did, didn't I?"

"_Yes_."

"Well, I . . . I don't know. I'm confused. I don't know how I feel absolutely just yet, but I do know that I don't want to lose you to anyone else." Jasper glanced around, toying with her fingers rapidly, as a sort of strange pain filled Alice's eyes.

"Well, what does that _mean_?" Alice's voice sounded as though it was being crushed with her distraught and uncertainty.

"Alice . . . I don't know anything."

"You must know_ something_! A simple _drop _of anything; judgment, sensibility, the way you're leaning closer to . . . Please, Jasper, you have to give me some sort of answer!"

He shook his head as a response.

"The _fuck_ does that mean?" she questioned through gritted teeth, distress invisibly leaking from her pores. "Don't you know anything about your fucking desires, Jasper?"

He chuckled slightly, hiding his face, but he knew this was no time for any sort of laughter from the tone of the chuckle.

"_Well_? Jasper why are you fucking vacillating towards me?" Alice snapped, closing her eyes for a moment.

He looked up, and Alice was shocked at the seriousness that was still evident in his eyes and expression. "I don't mean to vacillate, Alice . . . ," he stated, trailing off, but sounding completely acute.

"Then _what_ is your dec –"

But he cut her off . . . by pushing his lips to hers.

The kiss was very tender and warm, but filled with need and distraught on both sides. Alice could feel the sensitivity, but could also the distress, the confusion, the anxiety . . . This kiss was different.

Alice kissed him, and Jasper kissed back, communicating silently with this physical touch.

Now Alice knew which side Jasper's desires were closer to . . .

Now Jasper knew why Alice had been seducing Edward . . .

Now Alice knew about Jasper's indecisive attitude . . .

And now Jasper knew why Alice was acting different . . .

Everything was explained. The pieces of the puzzle had finally come together, confusion turned to answers, understanding more dominant than any sense of perplexity. And the two couldn't do anything else but stand in the street, their arms wrapped around each other, and silently communicate with a their frigid lips pressed to one another's.

But then Jasper picked her up, holding Alice in his arms bridal style, and carried her away from The Sewer, and toward the subway entrance. Alice noticed this, and asked breathlessly, as it was in between kissing Jasper, "What about everyone else?"

"They can find their own way home, can't they?" he responded, kissing Alice between each of his words. "There is really no need to worry on about them, Alice."

She smiled, and they continued down the street, ignoring the drunken peoples' calls, whistles, and slurred remarks.

Jasper set her down once he had found the subway entrance, making sure their lips did not pause, and guided Alice onto the escalator, still kissing her sweet lips, as they traveled down into the deserted underground subway station together.

They held hands as they jumped the restrictors.

They kissed as they waited for their subway.

Jasper held Alice as they shuttled home, the frost beginning to get to Alice once they entered onto the train. She leaned into him, her head in his lap, and he rubbed her arms, trying to produce some heat with friction, for Alice was shaking rather violently.

As soon as they entered Edward's apartment, their lips locked once more, and they started undressing each other immediately, Jasper tearing the enduring shreds of clothing from Alice's body, Alice, undoing buttons and then sliding various articles of clothing off.

They stumbled into the guest bedroom, limbs tangled, flesh stroking flesh, fingers finding fingers.

Jasper removed his lips from Alice's just an inch so they were still but a breath away from each other, and asked her softly, his voice filled with concern, "Are you ready?"

Alice opened her eyes, and Jasper's heart ached when he saw their innocence. She was breathless as she replied, "Yes."

"Tell me if anything hurts."

"Okay. Have you done this before?"

"Twice."

Alice tittered before their lips could meet again, and Jasper gave her an uncertain glance. But she rolled her eyes, and clutched the sides of his face, looking deep into his hazel, almost topaz colored eyes, and said softly, "I am ready. And I want you. Not because of Edward. Not because I'm ahead of myself. Not because I'm crazy. Not for _anything_, Jasper, but you." And then she found his lips again, and it started.

The pain Alice felt built in every probe of Jasper's. She could feel herself tear, but she could feel the pleasure too, as it mixed heavily with the agony of skin ripping and blood spilling.

Alice was breathless throughout, the pain leaving her so. But the _pleasure_; the pleasure was almost as unbearable as the pain. It was extraordinary, like nothing she had ever felt before in her entire life. Not even with drugs. She couldn't help uttering "ah"s and "ooh"s, to which Jasper often furrowed his brow or frowned.

So, the pain was excruciating? So, she could even hear the pops, crunches, and cracks of her tissues breaking down? But the pleasure, the powerful instincts, the suddenly livened senses, and the strong emotions could overshadow all of that . . . mostly. And the fact that it was with Jasper made it all seem very bearable as well.

Alice could feel herself becoming emotionally dependent on Jasper, but did not recognize it.

It was crazy, it was new, it was agonizing, but Alice could see why it was so beautiful to everyone.

Then Alice felt something shatter; it rippled through her entire system. But it wasn't physical splintering, it was something else . . . something different. Different from emotional as well. Alice couldn't explain any of it, but it was eclipsing everything in her: her thoughts, the pain, her instincts, her emotions . . . there was only this one, intense occurrence.

Her eyes burst opened, and her heart, mind, and face melted. It was consuming her. It was filling her lungs, making it harder to breathe. It was filling her expression, so she was paralyzed in just one appearance: mouth opened, obviously awed and eyes freed; they were seeing everything going on in a new, more beautiful light.

Jasper must have been experiencing this as well. His face was awed like Alice's, and his sparkling hazel eyes were bright, filled with a new color and light: they were an animated gold.

One more push, and Jasper squeezed his eyes shut with the intensity, and Alice screamed.

The pain, the pleasure . . .

The power.

There was passion, there was force, and then there were things Alice couldn't explain or fathom. This one last of push of Jasper's had created a mixture of all three of these things.

Alice screamed again. She felt her spine arch, lifting from the bed, and into Jasper.

Her toes curled, and she dug her heels into the mattress.

And her arms began to tremble.

Alice was now hyper aware of everything, even more so than before. She very conscious of her hips digging into Jasper's hips, of her shaking fingers on his muscular back, of his lips on her shoulder, of her once normal breathing pattern now turned into short gasps, even the sound and feel of skins against skin was thunderous in Alice's ears.

Jasper grunted, and started panting.

Alice could only scream.

And then it was over.

Jasper rolled over and onto the bed beside Alice, panting heavily, even sweating a bit.

But Alice was just paralyzed.

As abruptly as it had started with that one push, it had ended. And now it was all over.

She was throbbing, still in leftover pain, but she laughed. She was basking in the afterglow. She felt beautiful and lucky and special . . . so she smiled and laughed, continuing to bask while Jasper merely watch, a thin smile on his lips as he panted.

"Oh my _god_!" Alice shrieked, still laughing uncontrollably, her cheeks beginning to ache. "That was . . . that was . . ."

"Amazing?" Jasper finished for her.

"_Yes_!" she exclaimed, laughing harder. "_Better_!"

Jasper sighed in content. "Yeah."

Then his fingers inched over to hers. Alice's laughter died down, leaving a giddy smile and flushed cheeks. Their fingers met, and locked, interlaced so they would never let go.

**Did you listen to NUDE BY RADIOHEAD while reading? Did you like the lemon? Was it sensory? Was it emotional? Was it perfect? Or did it just completely fail? These are the questions I wanted answered in the REVIEWS because you know I love you and that you want to make me happy!! Thank you:)**


	10. There, There

_There's always a siren singing you to shipwreck . . . Don't reach out, don't reach out . . . Stay away from these rocks . . . We'd be a walking disaster . . . Don't reach out, don't reach out __. . .__ Just 'cause you feel it, doesn't mean it's there . . . There's someone on your shoulder . . . Just 'cause you feel it, doesn't mean it's there . . . There's someone on your shoulder __. . . __There, there . . ._

_Why so green . . . And lonely? . . . Heaven sent you . . . To me . . . We are accidents waiting . . . Waiting to happen . . . We are accidents waiting . . . Waiting to happen . . ._

When Jasper and Alice make love, the entire world explodes. Not lying. Everything. Literally. Explodes.

After making love all that night, they had good reason to believe they were both indestructible. The force, passion, and strength they both exemplified as they explored each other that night was so powerful, it's almost impossible to understand how they survived it all.

After a quick little break, the two immediately jumped into the second round. Jasper crashed his lips into Alice's, blazing a trail with them down the side of her mouth, all the way to her collarbone (Jasper couldn't help marveling at the fineness, the evenness of the protruding bone). Then Alice smoothed her hands over the planes of his chest and face, digging her fingernails in deeper and deeper into his tanned skin.

Jasper pushed Alice up against the wall, creating a dent her shape and size exactly. Alice didn't notice a thing.

Alice thrust him off of her, and he fell back onto the groaning bed. Then Alice followed, toppling on top of him. The creak of overtaxed springs breaking sounded from beneath them.

Jasper's strong arms folded around Alice, pulling her close to him. Then their mouths close around each other.

Forming bruises were disrupted as new ones were prepared to be created when Jasper rammed him hips into Alice's. Their bodies were close, skin against skin, but their minds were connected.

Alice and Jasper panted and groaned into each other's necks, their flesh becoming slick, and instincts were released. Everything was wonderful, everything was beautiful. Life was suddenly different because when those instincts took over, both Jasper and Alice could only see the good in everything and everyone.

Their emotions intertwined. Their hearts pumped rapidly, hammering against each other, begging to be broken free of their skin and bone prison, and tangle into each other.

Then everything splintered and cracked, undulating throughout their bodies simultaneously. They both experienced the most unfathomable feeling in the world, their emotions and instincts in complete control of their mind, the climax of everything. The world was . . . exploding.

Material things were obviously ruined in this event: the wall, the bed, and lately, the headboard, for in their heat and passion, their bodies cracked it. But then their world was really exploding, built up beyond anything else, the feeling simply impenetrable and bottomless. How vast everything became in Jasper and Alice's eyes, how linked and clear everything became to them. It was simply . . . unimaginable . . . and beautiful.

It was an explosion. Literally.

Alice forced a breathless scream, and then Jasper pulls away, falling to the sheets, damper than he was before. Alice doesn't laugh like she did the first time, but instead stares up at the ceiling, thoughts racing, skin sweating, blood pounding.

That time was much quicker than the first. They both were left with less air in their lungs, and much wetter than before. Alice turned to Jasper, and laughed, "That was quick."

Jasper chortled slightly, obviously winded, and agreed, "Yeah. That lasted maybe a minute?"

Alice laughed louder, and rolled into his chest.

And she stayed there, inhaling Jasper's sweet-swelling aroma she only noticed after they had sex. She thought about what they had done and what they were doing. She thought about people too: Edward and Bella, her mother and father, her dead sister, Cynthia . . .

She noticed her breathing was settled now; it was normal. Her heartbeat was no longer sporadic and she was not panting or gasping. And the air had dried, rung free of giddiness, passion, and force now. It was like a sponge had been swiped across it all, removing all traces of Alice and Jasper's sinful act of natural pleasure.

Everything was calmed. It had seemed almost instant . . .

Alice thought about the immediateness sex seemed to be all about. It lasted but a minute. And now the afterglow had lasted but a minute as well. Fast. It was all very, very fast.

Alice inhaled slowly. She held it in. When she was bound to burst at any moment from the intake, she let it go in a gust of air from her mouth, letting it pour, letting it imitate the wind.

She ran her spindly fingers over Jasper's muscular abdomen soothingly. His breathing had steadied as well. She listened for a moment before whispering against his side, "I'm going to get something to drink from the kitchen; maybe a beer or maybe some . . . milk." She smiled to herself. "Maybe a few pills, if I can find any. Do you want anything?"

He breathed in sharply, and started stroking Alice's fingers. "No, nothing for me," he replied, his voice hoarse. He cleared his throat before continuing, "Don't take the pills with beer, okay?"

Alice smirked. "What's the fun of pills without alcohol?"

He mussed her inky black spikes of hair and then kissed her crown. "Fine then, go on. Come back soon though, yeah?"

"Of course."

She lifted herself from the bed slowly, carefully. Obviously, she was naked, so she fumbled around the room, and soon found the bra and underwear she had been wearing when she first arrived at the apartment: a white bra and pink boyshorts.

She tiptoed out of the room, and into the kitchen, only half clothed, having been too lazy and desperate to find the rest of her clothing. She groped in the dark until she found the coolness of the refrigerator. She yanked its door open, momentarily blinded by its light. Once her eyes adjusted, she found a beer can, and snapped it open; she left the refrigerator open so she could see in the darkness of the kitchen.

The first thing Alice noticed when she turned around was that there were three orange bottles of prescription medicine on the dingy kitchen counter: Seroquel, Trazodone, and Zaleplon.

Alice recognized the last one, Zaleplon; it was the medical term for a sleeping pill called Sonata she had seen advertised on TV often. Her mother frequently spoke of buying it – before learning it was prescribed and could become addictive – for her troubles in falling asleep. Alice shied away from this one, opting for both the Seroquel and Trazodone, though those two names did not sound familiar to her at all.

She swallowed two pills from each, followed by a swig of beer. She guzzled the rest of the can, threw it away, and shut the refrigerator door. Then she shuffled to the foldout chairs, sat in one, and waited for the mixture of prescription pills and beer to start working; she wanted her next time with Jasper to be even more vivid than the past two.

Soon enough, the pills and alcohol started to react. The room around Alice swirled, distorting the walls, warping the single window. Everything became gray rather than black too.

Then there were lights; firework sort of lights, not like light bulb sort of lights. They popped and cracked all around Alice, causing her to laugh and giggle at them. Alice extended her hand to one light, but it burned her. She seized her hand away, pulling it to her chest. She heard sizzling and popping, but she wasn't sure if it was the miniature fireworks or her hand. She began to panic and quickly stood up, and ran away, away from the little fireworks, still cradling her hand to her bare chest.

Alice started panting. Her hand was burning. She backed into a wall, and slumped her back down it. She put her hand to the wall, and it soothed the burning almost instantly, as if it were a nice, large bag of soothing ice. She closed her eyes in relief.

The fireworks were gone, but Alice was still high and giddy. She started laughing her old, bubbly laugh hysterically.

Alice couldn't be sure, but she thought she felt a little unconscious the very next second. Or maybe she had just fallen asleep was all, but she couldn't be sure; she had been high after all. It was probably a bit more feasible that she had fallen asleep though, because when the door burst open, revealed Bella and Edward, Alice awoke.

Edward flicked the light switch, and saw Alice, leaning against the wall on the ground. She was smiling, her eyes drooping.

Both Edward and Bella were drunk.

As Edward gruffly said goodnight, and stumbled into his bedroom, promptly falling asleep, Alice fell asleep again as well. But unlike the other two, Bella turned out the overhead lights again, and waited at the foldout table in the kitchen silently.

After a few minutes or so, Alice woke again. She was groggy because the pills were starting to wear off a little bit. She had fallen asleep twice, and had now completely forgotten about Jasper in their room.

She stumbled over to the kitchen, her motions blurry, not sure what she was suppose to be doing or why.

"Hi, Alice," Bella said abruptly as she passed her. Her back was rigid, not touching the back of her chair.

Alice squinted, trying to see Bella in the darkness. When she finally made out a mass that was a little bit darker than the blackness, she smiled a little bit, and responded, "Hey, Bella!"

"You're high?"

"Yeah, of course, silly!"

The sound of a chair moving against the carpet resonated in the silent room. Bella had risen, but Alice had yet to realize this.

"Good," Bella said under her breath.

Alice's forehead wrinkled, trying to understand what she had said, but before she could give it too much thought, two bony hands wrapped around her neck pushing her into the wall.

Alice's eyes widened in fear; she was too high for this.

"Don't you ever get near _my _boyfriend ever again, okay?" The voice sounded like Bella's, but Alice was too distressed to be absolutely sure; the hands were choking her. Bella's words ran by her once again, louder and backwards, scaring Alice even more.

"He's mine; don't ever take him away from me, ever, or I will fuck you up so bad you won't even remember why you're talking out your _ass_ the next day!" The words ran by Alice twice after this: the first time they were distorted, sounding electronic. The second time, they went by backwards like they had with Bella's first statement.

"I don't . . . don't know . . ." Alice tried to tell Bella, but the walls and Bella's angered face were running past her so fast, she couldn't even keep up with her own ideas and sentences.

"Don't get near him, alright? _Alright_?!" Bella yelled directly into her ear. The words were repeated, and then recited backwards once more. "I swear, if you touch anything that belongs to me ever again, I'll fuck you up, okay? I said, _okay_?" Every word was repeated over and over again, once said, sounding electronic and quite frightening to Alice.

Then Bella slapped her. Alice yelped, and the sound was electronic, much like Bella's sentence.

"_I'll fuck you up, I'll fuck you up, I'll fuck you up . . ."_

Alice screamed again, Bella's grip on her neck tightening.

"_I said okay, I said okay, I said okay . . ."_

Then everything suddenly . . . disappeared. Bella was gone. Bella's hands were gone, away from Alice's neck.

Alice was obviously confused now, still being high and all; so, she closed her eyes, squeezing them as tight as she could, and tried to work things out. Finally, she concluded to herself, _Where has Bella gone? One minute she was choking me; the next, she and her hands have disappeared, _and then began to repeat it in her mind over and over again.

Then Alice sighed, defeated, in the middle of repeating her new mantra, and decided to just not think anymore; she was too high to even hold onto her new mantra after a few seconds! It, thinking, was also giving her quite a painful headache as well.

But she nearly screamed when she saw a worried-looking pink elephant that had taken Bella's place in front of her.

Alice squinted and rubbed her eyes in newfound confusion.

Then the sympathetic elephant's long trunk reached out at her, trying to stroke Alice's cheek in an act of comfort, but she panicked, and swatted it away, cowering into the wall. "Where is _Bella_?" she questioned the hallucination, raising her voice.

The concerned pink elephant flickered into the angered Bella; it flashed back and forth between the two, confusing Alice even more than she already was. So, she pretended to faint, hoping both of them would leave her alone if she they thought she was unconscious.

So, Alice lay on the floor, eyes closed, barely breathing. She was doing her best to remain still.

But after only seconds of this charade, she remembered Jasper back in their room – his face flooding her mind – and she stood up again, forgetting all about the flickering elephant and Bella.

Alice smiled again, and staggered into the guest bedroom where Jasper lay still and half asleep.

She saw him there, and her smiled widened. She kissed his cheek, and his eyes opened lazily, for he was sleepy. But once he saw Alice's face and tousled hair, he was awake and lively once more.

Alice smiled, and stood on top of the bed, looming over Jasper. She looked down at him, a crazed smile on her lips and a wild look in her eye, and said to him, absolute certainty of her request ringing in her voice, "I want you to push me off this bed."

Jasper shook his head, glancing downward, and then looked up at her with an amused smile. "Why?" he asked.

She lifted her head to the ceiling, and closed her eyes. She raised her arms so they were level with her shoulders, and made a T. "I want to feel something – anything; I haven't fallen in a such a long, long time, so I want you to push me off of this bed right now."

Jasper kneeled in front of her. "What if you crack your head on the floor? And you're hurt?"

Alice breathed in, still in her T-shaped position. "I don't care; I just want the feeling of plummeting, descending, plunging, dropping . . . of having been pushed. Push me."

Jasper ignored her wish, and instead began to kiss her thighs. Alice's eyes rolled back into her head, her head fell back, and shivers sped up and down her spine rapidly, obviously pleasured by Jasper's soft lips and sweet breath grazing over her skin.

"Push . . . me . . ."

He slowly slipped the boyshorts down her legs, and began to kiss her hips and abdomen while his hands spread over the small of her back, sending up more zaps of electricity.

"Push . . . just . . . just push . . . me . . . off . . ."

Jasper continued to ignore this request, instead kissing trails up and down her stomach and stoking her back.

Soon, Alice couldn't take anymore. She ripped off her bra, and dove down into Jasper's arms, shaking the bed. The overburdened springs finally popped with that last move, and the headboard turned to rubble above them. There was a dent in the wall behind the bed that was created because Alice's force and passion that time.

And so the third round progressed.

When everything was done, Alice rolled into Jasper's chest again, and they both sighed in unison; the two were thoroughly tired, Alice especially. They were ready for sleep.

But Alice only wanted to try just one more thing, tell Jasper just one more thing before they _both_ drifted off into a blissfully deep and unconscious slumber instantly.

Half asleep, she lifted a flat palm into the air, just above her chest, and then whispered, "Jasper . . ."

Jasper was just as drowsy and ready to sleep, but understood what she wanted. He lifted his own palm to meet Alice's. His was much larger of course, but when they were placed together like that, flat palms and fingers meeting, it felt like they had always belonged just like that. Then Jasper murmured softly in response, "Alice . . .?"

"I wanted to kill myself."

Alice hadn't exactly been holding that statement in, but she hadn't exactly told him it like that, pointblank. But now that she did, she could feel a weight that was gone from her shoulders. That was the last "secret".

Without waiting for a response from Jasper, Alice then proceeded to fall asleep rather timely, devoid of a "goodnight".

"I know."

**If you watch the British TV show, Skins, you'd see the similarities between a certain episode from Series 3 and this chapter, but if you don't watch the show, well . . . too bad for you;)**

**Also, you'll notice one of the scenes was taken from a quote that was spoken by a character in Skins (Effy Stonem), which is also on my profile. If you can find the quote and recite it back to me in a review, I'll officially crown you with awesomeness:) Deal?**

**So, of course, any sort of review (flames, praise, CRITIQUE, updates, etc.) is immediate love:)))**

**Thanks, guys!**


	11. All I Need

_You are all I need . . . You are all I need . . . I'm in the middle of your picture . . . Lying in the reeds . . . I'm a moth, who just wants to share your light . . . I'm just an insect, trying to get out of the night . . . I only stick with you . . . Because there are no others . . . You are all I need . . . You're all I need . . . I'm in the middle your picture . . . Lying in the reeds . . . It's all wrong . . . It's all right . . . It's all wrong . . ._

A week and a half had crashed by since that vital night between Alice and Jasper. A week and a half of making love, smoking cigarettes and weed, drinking plenty of alcohol, and getting high off prescription pills that were lying around the apartment. Only Alice did most of the things on that list, but the sex required both sides.

The two could both unanimously agree that that was the greatest week and a half of their lives.

Edward and Bella, on the other hand, were both having a rather lousy week and a half.

Bella was at the height of conquering her anorexia, which was driving her crazy, which meant extra dosages of her special painkillers. However, this led to money issues, which was Edward's department.

Edward was the somewhat steady flow of income. But because his inheritance was about to run dry (the financial amount of his apartment rent and maintenance, prescription pills, dope, alcohol, cigarettes, and other sorts of drugs was finally starting to pile up) and he had no other way of attaining a sort of income, he was starting to feel the heat of it. His pockets were about to become empty. He never got to college, as his parents had wished, so he could not get a well-paying job. And Bella was frantic for drugs in order to take her mind off her eating disorder.

So, naturally, things between the couple were starting to get edgy and rather testy, whereas with Alice and Jasper, things were finally starting to heat up between them.

At the end of the week and a half, after a small quarrel between she and Edward, Bella was doing extra work at the houses she usually cleaned; just enough that she could get scrape it all together and then go out to her drug dealer and buy her special painkillers that only he sold. She really just needed a huge dose that would knock her out and she could sleep to get her mind of her weight loss obsession. Also, Bella figured as she vacuumed the Morrisons' carpet that morning, maybe Edward would stop trying to shovel food down her throat if she was asleep.

Also at the end of that week and a half, after the already mention squabble between the couple, Edward set out, searching for a job where he qualified and that would pay better than minimum wage. So far that morning, he was not having any luck.

But at these early morning times when Edward was fretting over money and a job, and Bella was preoccupied with drugs and starving herself, Jasper and Alice were just waking up.

Naked and sprawled across the bed, Jasper and Alice's limbs tangled and their bodies close, Jasper woke groggily to the morning sun's rays as they shone through the Venetian blinds of the only window in their room brightly and conspicuously.

Jasper breathed in deeply, and his heavy eyelids blinked slowly. He and Alice had been up all night. It was only a few hours ago that they had finally fallen asleep, exhausted.

Jasper propped himself up on his elbows, and glanced around the room. The orangey tint of morning was casting lines across the wall, lighting the room slightly. The bed was in disarray, the sheets lying on the floor. Clothes were scattered around. Alice's arm was draped across his abdomen, her head tucked into his chest. She was sleeping soundly, her breathing peaceful. Jasper laid back down carefully, and watched Alice's naked chest rise up and down soundlessly. He soon met her pace, breathing in the same rhythm. He closed his eyes, but found he was no longer drowsy. So he instead focused on Alice again.

He liked to watch her sleep. She was so beautiful, so tranquil. How something could look so amazing like that astounded and awed Jasper. So he continued to merely watch her. Watch her chest rise and fall in time. Watch her purple lids that shuttered her big blue eyes. Watch her coy red lips that appeared to be upturned in a tiny smile. Watch the one person Jasper could think confidently about, _You are all I need._

Jasper smiled. He saw a stray piece of hair, a black spike, that had fallen over Alice's face.

But when he brushed it away, Alice's eyes flew open, and she grabbed Jasper's wrist, her other hand poised in a fist awkwardly. They stared into each other eyes for a little while before Jasper asked, his voice low and amused, "Why are you going to punch me?"

She released his wrist and laid down her fist. "I was having a bad dream. I suppose I unconsciously thought your touch was the murderer's, so I awoke, ready to defend myself. Does that make sense?" explained Alice, without taking her eyes from Jasper's.

He smiled, and brushed his fingers across her face again. "You were dreaming about a murderer?"

"Yes."

"Who was he?"

"You."

Jasper cast his glance away from Alice. He dropped his hand from her cheek. He was still smiling faintly, but Alice knew that she shouldn't have said that. "I'm, I'm sorry, J-Jasper, I –"

"You think that I would hurt you, Alice?" he asked, interrupting her, his voice cracking when he said "hurt".

Alice laid her hand on his. "No. Oh, it was only a dream, Jasper, nothing to worry over! You would never hurt me, and I know that."

"Do you?"

Alice rolled her eyes, and smiled. She kissed his cheek. "Yes, I know that you, Jasper Hale, would never hurt me, ever, okay?" she replied, as if not knowing would be completely absurd. He looked up again, and widened his smile at her. "Let's go get something to eat now."

He nodded, and they rose from bed. Alice grabbed her white bra and pink boyshorts and an oversized T-shirt from the closet, throwing on the underwear then the T-shirt that swallowed her tiny frame. Jasper pulled on his boxers and a white undershirt.

They entered the kitchen, and Alice started scouting out the fridge as Jasper waited by the opposing counter.

When Alice bent over, the shirt went with her, revealing her pink panties. Jasper was directly behind her, and when he saw this, he couldn't help but to stare at her . . . assets as Alice bent to retrieve some beer from the bottom drawer of the refrigerator.

She straightened, and Jasper tried to look away before Alice turned and realized he had been staring at her ass.

But she caught him at the last moment.

She gave a knowing half-smile that Jasper did not see as she handed him a beer. She watched as he snapped his open and started drinking from it, while she merely fiddled with her own.

Memories from the previous nights were flooding her mind.

Gentle caresses, affectionate strokes, panting to each other as if it were another language, loving fingertips sliding down skin, and silent kisses blazing trails down shoulders, through the valley of her breasts, down stomachs, around necks . . . it was a downpour of remembrance from all of the previous week and a half. And it was getting Alice a little . . . sprung. And she was supposing Jasper was up for anything, seeing as he had been staring at her ass just then.

Jasper put his can down on the counter, causing Alice to jump, for it forced her out of her mind and thoughts rather suddenly. He eyed her and asked her, a little amused by it, "Alice, are you okay? You didn't drink anything and you seem a little bit . . . jumpy."

Alice moved to the counter, where she placed her full can beside his empty one. "Yeah, yeah, I'm fine." Then Alice leaned in Jasper. She placed her fingertips on his chest and tilted her face so it was looking upward at his. "I'm really, absolutely, just fine, Jasper."

Jasper lowered his head, and touched his forehead to hers, their noses' sides touching as well. If either moved their body even a centimeter closer, their lips would have had instant contact because they were so close. "Are you sure?" Jasper asked.

Alice wrapped her arms around his neck. Jasper's arm coiled around her hips. "Yes, I am positive."

Jasper then lifted Alice, swiveled around, and sat her down on the counter. Even when Alice was in this position, they were about the same height. Alice wrapped her legs around Jasper's waist. "Good."

Alice pressed her lips to Jasper's. At first it was slow and sweet. But then as their passions ignited, the kisses got fiercer, feverous, building into something powerful. In a matter of minutes, Alice had discarded her panties and Jasper's boxers, and Jasper was poised for entry.

Without a second thought, Jasper entered, and started delving. Alice's breath caught in her throat as soon as he started, and she had to pull away and grappled onto his head, interweaving her fingers in the waves of his honey-colored hair, for support.

Alice started to moan, her breathing pattern becoming shaky and ragged. Jasper was panting.

Kitchen sex that is so heated and arduous that you don't even have time to undress each other, the two concluded in their minds silently, was almost as good as the _first_ time.

Bella had just bought some extra dosages of her painkillers, and was a block away, the apartment in sight; she was so eager to knock herself out – literally – that there was even a bounce in her step.

Edward however was rounding the opposite corner, feeling shitty for being luckless in finding a job that morning; he needed a cigarette, so he was somewhat eager to get home as well.

Bella looked up and saw Edward. Even though they had had a tiff over money earlier that morning, Bella still loved to see her lover's pale face and bronze hair.

Edward rounded the corner, and immediately saw a deathly skinny girl with pallid skin, mousy brown hair, matching eyes, who seemed abnormally excited. He could pick out this person from a crowd of a million identical people and be right every time: it was his Bella. Unappealing to every other male she crossed with? Maybe. But to _him_? Obviously the most beautiful person on earth.

They had been fighting earlier that morning over money and drugs and such, but she was still making him smile when he saw those thin lips twist upward in a perpetually faint smile.

They met at the steps of the apartment, and exchanged greetings. They gazed at each other for a few moments before Edward sighed, casting his eyes downward, his voice sounding guilty, "I'm sorry about us fighting this morning. I've been looking for a job you know. You were definitely right: I do need to support you."

Bella smiled. "No, _you_ were right. I do need to chip in every now and then. So, I worked a little extra for the families I clean for, and scraped enough together so that I could pay for the drugs myself." She swung the plastic bag that was packed with the large painkillers almost to the top in front of his face. "You see?"

Edward took her other hand, the one that was not clutching the bag as if it could very well save someone's life. He looked deeply into her muddy eyes, and then said softly, "I love you."

That was the first time he had ever told her that. Bella blushed, bringing a bit of color to her pasty cheeks. She squeezed his hand weakly, and replied, "I love you, too."

It was the first time they had spoken those fatal words aloud to each other, though they'd secretly been thinking them to themselves almost every day. That is, when they weren't high or drunk.

The couple entered their apartment hand in hand, smiling. They both knew that they both had meant every word, and they were happy, despite the events of that week and a half.

But they opened the door to this scene:

Jasper was shoving his dick up Alice, who was on their fucking _kitchen counter_, over and over again; Alice seemed to be bouncing on the counter, he was pushing so damn hard. Alice was moaning and panting wildly, Jasper only panting.

Bella's jaw dropped instantly.

"What the fuck is going on?" Edward asked, yelling over the moans and pants, as soon as he had assessed the scene properly.

Jasper and Alice both looked over at the same time, and saw Bella's shocked expression, and Edward's expectant demeanor. They exchanged glances, and Jasper pulled away. He put on his boxers, and Alice pulled on her boyshorts, both keeping their eyes to the ground.

They shuffled away from the scene, intent on getting to their room so they could avoid Edward and Bella, and also, hopefully, finish what they were almost done with.

But Edward stopped them both right in their tracks with the question: "Well? What was going on?"

He crossed his arms over his chest, waiting for a response. Bella was frozen in her position with her mouth opened in absolute shock, her eyes popping out of their sockets.

Alice bit her bottom lip, but before anyone could say anything else, blurted suddenly, "We were having sex."

Edward rolled his eyes. "Well, obviously. My question was a little more profound than that though, Alice. Do you either of you mind answering it for me completely now?"

The words gushed from her mouth just like before: "All week and a half long Jasper and I have been having sex. The first time was the night we went out to that club. Literally, all week, all we've been doing is . . . having sex. And there was some drinking. And getting high a lot. And smoking, there definitely was smoking as well."

Bella's jaw abruptly snapped shut. The grip on her bag of painkillers tightened, and she sped to the counter, where she grabbed Alice's discarded beer, and chugged it along with two of the large capsules from the bag. She then left the room for her bedroom, yelling behind her shoulder as she was slamming the door shut, "Napping!"

Edward yelled, "okay" back to her, and then walked over to where Alice and Jasper were frozen.

He clicked his tongue, and then smiled, amused at Alice and Jasper's newfound union. "So you guys have been banging? All week? That's all you did? Was just fuck each other?"

They exchanged a glance, and then nodded.

Edward turned to Alice. "I thought you said nothing was going on between you to when we were at the docks."

Alice shifted her gaze to her bare feet. "Well, nothing was, even though I know that I secretly wanted something to be. What I never told you was that when we got home and Jasper and I went into the guestroom to play cards, we kissed. Then he said nothing was going on between us, and that dismayed me, so I tried to make him jealous by going after _you _–"

"So _that's_ what you were doing?" both Jasper and Edward interrupted her in unison.

She rolled her eyes and nodded. She then continued, "So you and I danced at the club," at that mention, Jasper had to glance downward in his slight discomfort, "and then the Bella incident happened, and I ran out, but Jasper followed me out of the club, and we starting kissing again, and then we went home and had sex in the guestroom the second we got back. And we've been _banging_ ever since."

Edward smiled slightly. "Yeah, so, you guys have been secretly fucking? Behind my back this whole time?"

Alice shrugged. "I suppose, yeah."

Then he suddenly clapped Jasper's shoulder and laughed. "I was wondering when you were gonna get some, little baby cousin Jasper! So no longer a pussy virgin now, yeah?"

Jasper became stoic. "I've fucked two other girls before Alice. She's the one who was the virgin, Edward."

Alice grinned.

Edward laughed. Then sex escapade stories were swapped. Alice and Jasper told Edward about their times, but without details. The details were for their minds only they knew.

An hour had passed, maybe. So when Bella came into the kitchen again, looking as high as ever, Edward had to raise his eyebrows because he knew she couldn't have been napping. But that didn't stop Bella. She was looking as joyful as ever on the contrary, whether that was due to the drugs or something else was hard to tell.

She came in and right up to Edward. Even Alice could see her eyes were obviously dilated from the drugs. "I got it back, Edward," Bella was telling him. "I've gotten it back!"

"You _did_?" Edward asked in response, obviously shocked. His attention had now switched from sex to Bella.

"_Yes_!" Bella screamed.

"What? What has she gotten back?" Alice asked, being a bit nosey, but it was before she could stop herself.

Bella turned and faced her, smiling happily. Alice did not smile back, remembering the instances of the night they had been at The Sewer. There and later on. "Menstruation!"

"What?"

"It's back!"

"Your _menstruation_? When did it leave?"

"My eating disorder. It got so bad that it went away. I was almost hospitalized for it a month or two ago, but they told me if I started to reform immediately, I wouldn't have to. So I did, and this is the first sign that it's working! My crimson waves are _back_!"

Alice grinned. "That's so great, Bella!"

Then she grabbed Edward's hand, and pulled him into their bedroom, intent on "showing him".

Alice smiled and walked into her bedroom with Jasper. "That's really great, isn't it, Jasper? She's so happy!"

But Jasper didn't reply. He seemed to not even be there, he was so silent, but Alice didn't appear to really notice anything. She was tired, her goal a nap in her nice, big, disorderly bed.

She flopped down, and curled into a ball. She closed her eyes. Jasper sat down on the edge of the bed, barely making a sound as he did so. There was silence. Alice was about to fall asleep when Jasper finally spoke, his words low and raspy, "It's been a week and a half, yeah?"

"Yeah," Alice affirmed sleepily, her voice muffled.

"Alice, it's the tenth. What about _your_ . . . menstruation?"

His voice was so faint, it had sounded just barely above a whisper; Alice heard him just fine though.

It was then that Alice gasped, realizing something was wrong.

**Hurray for cliffhangers!**

**Hurray for sex!**

**Hurray for E/B lovin'!**

**And a **_**huge**_** HURRAY to everyone who's going to review this chapter because you know you are automatically love!!**

**REVIEWWWWW**


	12. Machine Gun

_If only I could see  . . . Return myself to me  . . . And recognize the poison in my heart  . . . There is no other place  . . . No one else I face  . . . The remedy, to agree with how I feel . . . Here in my reflecting  . . . What more can I say . . . For I am guilty . . . For the voice that I obey . . . Too scared to sacrifice a choice  . . . Chosen for me . . ._

**Wearing my dress and tights. About to go out, but I wanted to at least START this pivotal chapter. So here you are! Maybe I'll get the first paragraph done;)**

**Okay, I'm going to give you fair warning right now: this story is not going to go the way you guys you think it is after reading this chapter. It'll be so different from the other similar fics here. Major plot twists to ensue, not your typical plotline.**

Alice ran to the bathroom, and bolted the door shut. She counted it over in her head three times before going in a state of shock from the realization. Yes, it was tenth. Yes, she should have gotten it the third, a week ago exactly.

She had _missed_ her period.

And that could only mean one thing . . .

Alice screamed. Her hands flew to her mouth, shielding it. She was inhaling sporadically; it sounded as though she was gasping rapidly in sequence rather than breathing. She could feel moisture collecting in her eyes, and the gasps turned to sobs.

Alice dropped to the ground, squatting by the toilet. She grasped onto its cold porcelain rim. She couldn't stop her erratic breathing. She couldn't stop the spilt dampness. And she couldn't stop the boiling that was erupting in the pit of her stomach.

So, it gurgled up, and she vomited. She held her hair back as it poured into the toilet bowl uncontrollably. She watched it and her tears fall down, within, mingling in the water.

When the worst was over, Alice pulled back, and wiped her mouth. Her body was shaking violently, and her breathing pattern had become merely unstoppable gasps. She watched her fingers shake until she needed to wipe her eyes because everything had become blurry.

When the shaking had mostly stopped and her breathing was somewhat normal again, Alice made an attempt to stand. She gripped the porcelain sink for support, and slowly raised herself.

As soon as she was standing though, her knees started to quiver again, banging against each other, causing her to almost fell, so she sat down again, and started to cry once more.

She tried to wipe the tears away again, but once she succeeded, she couldn't prevent her mind from wandering to the thoughts that made her break down in the first place. So when she did, the tears sprang up once more, fresh in the corners of her eyes.

Alice made no attempt to eradicate these. Instead, she decided to let the relentless tears pour. It was pointless to try to stop them. But because she didn't stop them, she didn't distract herself from facing the reality of what was going on with her right then.

She. Was. _Pregnant_.

She had to be. She had missed her period, one of the biggest signs. She just _had to be_: that was the sad reality.

Alice felt out of place. Like this was not suppose to be happening. She was an outsider looking in on someone else and their crisis, not her own. Because it couldn't be _her_ . . . this had to be someone else. It was impossible if it was she. None of it was possible. This couldn't be _Alice Brandon_; this was someone else and someone else's crisis.

Alice looked at her trembling fingers. They were shaking, but not as violently as they had been earlier.

She looked at the spaces between her fingers. She imagined sand spilling through the holes, falling, slipping. The gaps between her fingers seemed to be getting larger. Her fingers were decreasing. The sand was slipping through faster and faster. Too fast. Alice couldn't close her fingers in time to stop the suddenly flesh-colored grains.

She closed her eyes, and balled her hands into fists without looking. She opened her eyes again. There wasn't any sand on the floor, and her fingers were normal once more.

But that had been the least of her problems.

A _baby_ was so much more worrisome than vanishing fingers.

Alice touched her fingers to her stomach. She swirled them around gently, feeling the skin stretched over.

Was there . . . was there actually something . . . _living_ in there, in her stomach? Existing, thriving, surviving . . . was there a _human being_ within her who was performing these acts?

Alice let her fingers drift farther down, to where her uterus was placed beneath the skin and bones.

She poked it with her index finger.

_It's there, precisely, that a fetus would be living_, Alice thought.

"Here," she said aloud. She pressed her fingers to the spot above her uterus. "Is this where you are, Baby?"

She knew it seemed a little bit crazy to be talking to an unborn fetus, but she continued, "Are you right in here? Can you hear me? I hope you can, you poor, unborn Baby."

Alice felt overcome. She wrapped her arms around her flat belly, and hugged it to her. She put her head near it, but she heard nothing. She knew something was there though. There had to be.

"Baby, I'm sorry I did drugs when you were being conceived. I'm sorry I drank alcohol. I'm sorry I smoked cigarettes. I'm really sorry. I hope you're all right in the end."

What would this child mean to her life? Alice didn't know. But she was clear of _one_ thing: she could not keep this.

"I'm sorry, Baby."

Then Alice pictured a little boy. He was a toddler, and had black and wavy hair; a combination of his parents' own locks. He had rosy cheeks and naturally tanned skin. Heavy lids shaded electrifying blue eyes. The child was tired. He was not happy. He was not being treated as he was supposed to be for his young age.

Though the child was beautiful and cherubic in Alice's eyes, his unhappiness overshadowed the pureness of the boy. It made him appear sorrowful rather than beatific, as he truly was.

Alice shook her head, shaking the image.

"I can't keep you. Hear that, Baby? I cannot keep you here. You wouldn't be happy, you know. It wouldn't be any good at all . . ."

Then the image of a beautiful young filled her mind as the image of the boy had. But this young child was different: she had long and straight blonde hair. Her hazel eyes were filled with pain. Her red lips were twisted downward, proving a frown. Her pale skin looked paler than it should. She did not seem to be happy either, and it eclipsed of her beautiful, angelic appearance and saintly demeanor.

Alice gasped hoarsely, the sound hoarse. The strange distraction forced the image away.

Alice applied a bit of pressure to her stomach. "I cannot have you. You wouldn't . . . be safe if I was your mother. You wouldn't be happy. None of this would be good for you. But, of course, you do not understand. You are merely a child. An unborn and rather unfortunate child . . ."

Alice hugged her stomach again, repeating apologies.

Yes, she was apologetic, it was true. But she did not love this unborn child enough to feel so remorseful toward it, that she had to keep it.

Alice wiped the tears away from her eyes and cheeks, and stood. She felt much better and back in control again.

But how she was going to tell anyone was unknown to her. When she thought if it, she felt sickness churn in the very bottom of her stomach, and she preferred to not vomit again, so she did not think about telling anyone, not even Jasper, the . . . _father_.

Jasper was the father.

Alice felt the remaining contents of her stomach gurgle. She quickly flushed that thought from her mind, and went out of the bathroom.

But as Alice contemplated the door in front of her, the one she was suppose to open, she concluded to herself she just needed to get out of that damned apartment soon.

Alice tiptoed back to her bedroom so she could change into something warm. Even after a week and a half, it was still snowing beautiful, individual, glittering snowflakes outside.

The snow had come to mean something to Alice. It reminded her of Jasper now.

But as she was passing through the kitchen, she heard a voice that asked, "Where are you going?" Of course, it was Edward, who was at the kitchen counter. He was eating a sandwich and smoking two cigarettes at the same time, something that now seemed _normal_ in Alice's eyes.

Alice crept over to him, and took a cigarette from his mouth. She began to smoke it with eyes closed because she was feeling the emotions she always felt when she smoked: relief, numbness, and clearness.

"You haven't answered my question," pressed Edward.

"Well I wasn't going to go anywhere, but I just . . ." she stopped herself. It took every once of courage and strength she had to not blurt out what she had just learned. She channeled her energy to her mouth, pleading with it, asking it not to say _anything _because no one could know. After a few minutes of persistence and potency, Alice found the valor, and swallowed the words. Literally. She took one large gulp, and then it was as if the words were gone, and she could not blurt them out. She smiled a little bit, thanked herself, and opened her eyes. She immediately breathed in shallowly, raggedly, for she had not been breathing when she was concentrating on keeping quiet about her secret.

"Need to get out," Alice finished, inhaling on her cigarette confidently, blowing the smolder into Edward's face.

He seemed a little suspicious, but soon gave it up when he asked, "Well, where? Where are you going to go? You won't want to go far; it's really cold outside, what with the new snow."

Alice nodded, and snuffed out her cigarette on Edward's paper plate. She took two from his pack, and lit them both immediately after. "I know. I'm just going to go wherever. Wherever I feel I'll find the . . . comfort I'm looking for, I guess."

"Is there something wrong with Jasper?"

Alice shook her head as smoke from her two cigarettes began to waft out of the corner of her mouth because she had taken in so much. "No, we're fine. We've been fine all week and a half, obviously. I just want to, you know, get away. See what else is there, is _here_."

"Are you going to dump Jasper or something?"

Alice shook her head. "No. I don't really know what I'm doing, or what I'm going to do, actually."

"Good to know."

Alice sighed, and all of the smoke in her mouth poured out. Ribbons of the smolder swirled above her, curling around her head like a wreath. She lifted her eyes to Edward's. "I don't know, okay? I don't know anything at all. All right? I'm going to go now. Where's Jasper?"

"Watching Bella. She's took a little too many of her pain pills, and I think she may have overdosed –"

"Overdosed?!" exclaimed Alice. A bit more smoke escaped her mouth when she said the single, lethal word.

"Yeah, but I'm sure she'll be fine. If she's not in an hour or so, we'll bring her to Emmett's father, who's a hotshot doctor, but he's nice, and gives us free checkups and whatnot. He'll fix her."

"So Jasper is with Bella now? In her bedroom?" It sounded like a presumptuous setting, but Alice knew Jasper wouldn't do anything with Bella. He'd betray both she and Edward, and Jasper wasn't that kind of person, especially to Alice.

Alice began to walk toward the guest bedroom. "Okay good. I'm going to change in the guest room. Don't tell him I left. If he asked, just don't answer. I'll be back later, yeah? My best to Bella, okay? I hope she gets better!" Alice cried as she locked her guestroom door shut.

Alice ravaged the closet. At first, all she found were T-shirts, jeans, and mini dresses. But as Alice dove in deeper, she began to pull out all sorts of discarded clothing: coats, sweaters, vests, tank tops, nice blouses, and the occasional pair of nice shoes.

After finding these buried, dressy articles of clothing, Alice guessed that, maybe, Bella and Edward had used this empty closet to abandon the clothes of their lives before they met each other. A sort of ceremony or rite to show that they were cleansing themselves of the life they used to have. It was a metaphor to show how they were ready to embrace a new lifestyle _together_ – obviously, it was one that did not include silky dress blouses and nice, pleated khaki pants.

Alice pulled out a black knitted sweater, and pulled it on hastily. She looked down at her oversized T-shirt that hung loosely off of her tiny frame. _It'll have to do_, she thought. She grabbed some black stockings and the sandals she'd worn when she first arrived, and flew out the door without so much as a "goodbye" to Edward or anyone.

Alice honestly didn't know where she was going or why, but she felt like wandering. She always felt like wandering around after something huge happened. After Cynthia killed herself, Alice was always dying to wander, but her parents kept her strapped in and close to them, convinced she was secretly hurting inside when really, Alice was only hurting because she longed to roam around to ease her pain. That was why she cut herself. It was a release from her parents' iron grip.

Alice ran her fingers over the healing scars. Some of the stitches had fallen out, though they probably weren't suppose to because the wounds were still red, swollen, and occasionally, very painful.

Alice hadn't known where she was going in the beginning, but when she looked up and out of her ambivalent trance, she couldn't identify the area. It did not look like the block the apartment was on. It didn't look like anything Alice had seen before. It was worse.

The buildings were dirtier and rustier. The pets were skinnier. The garbage was more plentiful. Not even the beautiful blanket of snow could mask the ugliness of this neighborhood.

She kept through though. She didn't know why, but she felt like she needed to get to somewhere.

Alice continued through the horrid neighborhood – never seeing a single soul anywhere at all – and eventually came to a narrow bridge. It didn't appear to cross anything very wide or very deep, so she traversed it without a second thought.

The bridge was quite slender, appearing that only one person could cross at a time. Two people could not together.

She ran her fingers over the wooden rails, unafraid of splinters, though she used to be terrified. She had now learned there were worse things than a trivial bit of wood stuck under the skin.

She let her fingers turn into legs, letting them actually _run_ now across the board of railing. Her two pale fingers looked like a person's legs. Like a real person. An actual _human being_ . . .

She shook her head. She had crossed the bridge. She seemed to be in a better neighborhood now; it wasn't superb, but it wasn't like the previous one. Alice continued on.

She soon passed by a small, tacky-looking drug store. In the window, she could see a small shelf dedicated to multicolored boxes . . . there was a variety of names with a variety of slogans and pictures on their boxes, but one thing was clear: that all of these boxes were for women. What Alice wanted to know was _what_ they _did_ for women.

"Let us tell you first" dashed across Alice's vision, and everything instantly clicked. These were . . . _pregnancy tests. _For people who were not sure if they were pregnant or not! Whatever lay in those packages was the key to knowing whether you were to be a mother or not.

But Alice already knew she was pregnant . . . didn't she?

Her fingers glided over her flat stomach absentmindedly. Well _did_ she? What if she wasn't pregnant, and this was all a misunderstanding? Alice's fingers flew away from her stomach, but she couldn't help speaking to it, "Baby, I think I should take one of those tests. Just to make sure. To make sure you're there, Baby." Alice deliberated for a second before adding, "You still know I can't keep you, right?"

Alice shook her head and then began to dig around in her sweater's pockets. As though it was a clear sign, she found a crumpled up five-dollar bill and some loose change.

Alice smiled slightly, and then entered the drug store. She didn't notice how her fingers had gravitated back to her stomach again as soon as she had opened the front door of the store though.

She went straight for the pregnancy test shelf.

They were a dollar each, so she picked out three she could test.

She brought her items to the counter. The cashier was a young girl with frizzy brown hair, tanned skin, and braces. They were the only two in the shop, Alice noticed as she was being rung up.

When the girl handed her a plastic that contained her items, Alice realized she couldn't go home with this – it would tip off Edward or Bella, and Jasper would know he'd been right!

"Do you have a bathroom?" Alice asked abruptly after she had paid and taken her bag. The girl looked up, and pointed to the back of the store where Alice saw two doors. "Thank you!"

She entered the bathroom and a dingy stall. She grabbed a box from the bag and tore it open. It her franticness, she had forgotten to read the instructions though. Alice tried to piece the box back together in order to read the tiny print on the back.

The instructions baffled Alice, but she went along with it: all she had to do was pee on the tip. She was to let it dry, and wait around five minutes, maybe less, for her results. There would either being a pink plus sign, confirming, or a blue minus sign, refuting.

Alice did as the directions said. After waiting her five minutes, she was hesitant to see the mathematical sign that would tell her if Baby was really there or not.

Eventually, her curiosity was too strong, and she had to look.

To her disdain and secret anticipation, there was a little pink plus sign staring back up at her, mocking her.

Alice tore open another box. She did the same thing as the first one had instructed her to do.

She waited five minutes.

Another plus sign was imbedded in the plastic.

She gulped. One more never hurt anyone? It could be the real one; these could be fakes!

Alice was desperate though. Now that she had known there was a chance than Baby could not be there, she did not want him _at all_. She didn't want him in the least anymore.

One more. The last one.

Tear the box.

Five minutes to wait.

Plus sign gloating on the plastic. It was a sadist. It was as if Baby had turned into a mathematical sign, leapt from Alice's stomach, and attached itself to the damn test.

"_Fuck!_" Alice screamed.

She threw the tests against the wall angrily, and slumped down to the bathroom floor, sulking.

She tried to calm herself down. She told herself everything would be fine. She told herself she could find a way out of this, she always found away out of anything and everything, so she could definitely handle weaseling herself out of this one.

She smoothed her fingers over her belly, and squeezed. It hurt her, but she felt no pain. She wanted Baby, selfishly enough, to feel the pain. "Oh, damn Baby, why?" she hissed to it.

The pain and anger bubbled up again when Alice pictured herself as an old lady with three cigarettes hanging out of her mouth, dowdy clothing, and an unhappy expression. Jasper was not in the image. A limp baby that could have been dead was hanging in her arms.

Alice punched her stomach. She wanted Baby to feel more pain, to understand the pain _she_ felt. "Why don't you understand that _I cannot keep you_?" she hissed. "I have no money: I cannot feed you, provide you with a bed, give you things you need to grow! I am young: I don't understand anything about fucking _babies_! And Jasper . . . is young." Alice paused. "He would abandon me. He would _abandon me_!"

Now, most of us know Jasper probably wouldn't do anything like that. But Alice, with the complicated, schizophrenic mechanisms of her brain, figured he would. It was her fear, insecurity, and mental disease that caused her to think of this idea of Jasper.

Alice stormed out of the bathroom. She was dying for a smoke.

She went to the counter, and asked for a pack of cigarettes. The girl asked if she had more money than two dollars. Alice shook her head, and buried her face in her arms on the counter.

Some moments of Alice sobbing and the cashier watching passed. But suddenly, Alice felt a warm hand on her shoulder. She looked up. It was the cashier, who was smiling now.

"You're pregnant?" she asked, her voice calm and very kind.

Alice nodded.

"Can't you support it? Can't the father support it?" she continued.

"_No_! I have no money and nowhere to go. Literally. I'm seventeen and ran away from my parents with this guy I barely knew about a week and a half ago. We're staying with his druggie cousin and girlfriend's crappy apartment. They have no money. They're about to go _broke_! I can't support and raise a fucking _baby_ in that fucked up place!"

"Is the father the man you barely knew who you ran away with about a week and a half ago?"

"Yes! He's so nice and considerate, but if he were rushed into this . . . I know he would leave me, I know it!"

The girl handed a pack of cigarettes and some matches to Alice. Alice greedily snatched them away, and immediately lit up three, and stuck them in her mouth. Once she started puffing successfully, she felt much better than before. She thanked the girl. The girl smiled and then said to her and a low tone, "I know a way you can get rid of a baby without paying for an abortion or doing one on yourself."

Alice's ears perked up. She blew some bluish smoke, and turned to the girl, enthusiasm in her eyes. "Yes?"

"Okay, this is what you gotta do: get this drug called Misoprostol. You're only suppose to take during your first or second month of pregnancy, which you are obviously in. Also, it's supposed to be used for peptic ulcers, but many people have illegally used it for abortion, and it worked in all cases. Oh, and it's only legal here in New York, I think." Alice nodded, smiling. The girl smiled back and continued, "Wait, there's some more! This is usually only used for an abnormal child, so chug tons of Motrin along with it for a couple of days, just to be safe. Motrin has been proven to kill babies during the first three months of pregnancy."

Alice was beaming now. Abruptly, she leaned over the counter, and embraced the girl in her spindly arms. "Thank you so much! You are a true lifesaver! Thank you!"

The cashier girl smiled. "Sure thing."

Alice couldn't wait to try out this newfound "cure" for Baby. She waved to the girl, yelling a "Goodbye" on her way out, and ran all the way back to Edward's neighborhood.

Once she was there, she located Emmett and Rosalie's apartment, and burst in. She ran up the stairs, not bothering with the creaky elevator. Once she found their room at the end of the long hallway, she flew in, panting with her cheeks flushed.

Rosalie looked up immediately, for she had been sitting on the ragged sofa, watching TV. She smiled somewhat. "Alice, isn't it?" she asked politely. Alice nodded. "Hi! What do you need? Did Edward and Bella send you here for something?"

Alice shook her head and panted, "Where is Emmett?"

Rosalie yelled for Emmett.

After a few moments, he came from a doorway, his hair damp. He looked at Alice and smiled. "Hey, kid! What's up? Someone send you?" he greeted her as he took a seat beside Rosalie on the couch. His floppy wet hair was wetting his gray T-shirt.

Alice shook her head again. "No. I do need something though," she huffed.

Emmett shrugged, eyes now fixed on the television, his arm around Rosalie's shoulders. "Yeah? What is it?"

"When are you going to the pharmacy?"

"Tonight's my nightshift. Why?"

"I need you to pick me up a few things, that's all." Alice's breathed had calmed, but she was still a little bit nervous.

"Well, what are they?"

"Lots and lots of Motrin and this drug called Misoprostol. Can you get them for me, by any chance?" she asked hesitantly.

Emmett looked up at her again. "You got ulcers?" he asked seriously, his eyebrow cocked.

Alice's eyes darted around the room nervously. "Umm . . . yes?"

Emmett clapped his hands together, which made a huge booming sound, and smiled widely. "Alright then! When do you need them by? Because I'm leaving tonight!"

"As soon as possible."

"Wait up for me. I'll drop them off when I get home, which is usually around three of four in the morning."

Alice was beaming as she nodded, said goodbye, and departed from the couple's apartment. She took the elevator down. She walked into the nipping cold once again.

This plan was in action. It was going to work!

Alice smiled, and ran her fingers along her belly where Baby _would be_ if Alice were not doing this. "Sorry, Baby. But I can't keep you. You've gotta go. You really do."

Alice smiled and continued to walk down the street back to the apartment, confident once more.


	13. Until We Bleed

**This is seriously a really intense chapter. It took me a long time to get back into the mode once I had left it for a little while. And that had happened a lot, seeing as I just started school again, and all that. So I'm really, REALLY sorry this took so long to get here, but here it is. I think it was worth the wait, personally;)**

It was a clean break. The moment Alice walked in the door, she went straight up to Jasper, who had been lounging on the sofa, smoking a joint, and told him she was not pregnant. She had taken a test. Three, actually. And she was not pregnant, she knew it for sure now. She was _absolutely_ sure of it now.

She was lying, of course.

Jasper didn't really say anything at first. He just stared ahead, and took a few drags. Alice stared at him though, still panting. Then he said, "Okay." And that was it.

Alice was a little frightened. She thought he'd be happier. But he obviously didn't care it seemed to her. He was different. He didn't care about her. And she didn't understand that. What had happened to Jasper?

He continued to stare unseeingly at the blank wall in front of him. Alice shifted her weight, forehead crumpled.

Finally, she asked, "What's wrong?"

He looked up at her. "Nothing," said Jasper, his tone as blank as his eyes as they stared up at Alice.

"Then why don't you care?"

"Care about what?"

"I'm not pregnant! You won't be a father, and I won't be a mother! We can still be kids! I'm not having a fucking baby! Don't you care? Aren't you happy? Why aren't you fucking happy? You should be happy!"

He took a drag and sighed the smoke away. He rose, and cracked a tiny smile. "You're not pregnant?"

Alice looked confused. "No."

His smile widened, and he embraced her. When he pulled back he pecked her lips, still smiling, and said, "Good."

"What's wrong?" Alice asked again.

"Nothing. I'm just stoned, Alice. I'm sorry. I was . . . I was worried about you and Bella."

"Is Bella alright?"

"Edward took her to the hospital half an hour ago. I've been toking up ever since. I'm worried about her. I was tending to her the whole time she was unconscious. I feel sorry for her."

"Oh my god, I hope she's alright!" Alice's eyes were sparkling with horror. She thought she was going to cry. Bella? Bella was always very unhealthy, it was true, but the thought of her actually dying of an overdose seemed unimaginable to Alice, though it was always a looming threat every moment Bella was just alive. But it was odd. Too odd. It was unreal, even, to Alice to think of Bella as _dead_.

"All I thought about when I was watching her was if that was you," Jasper said softly, his eyes cast downward.

Alice smiled, and wrapped her arms around his shoulders. She kissed him, and he kissed back with passion. She jumped up and wrapped her legs around Jasper's waist. He carried her to their bedroom, and laid her tenderly upon their bed, lips still attached.

He pulled back though, and pulled off his T-shirt as Alice yanked her sweater away. They collided again, resuming their kiss, their roughness and passion filling the air and mood.

Their kiss was becoming needier, filled with desire for each other. Tongue with tongue, lip with lip, meshing together like always. Alice loved their kisses because they were always perfect. Drugged, drunk, or stoned, they were always perfect. Sometimes they changed a little bit and sometimes they weren't as powerful, but they were always just right, with the right amount of passion, desire, lust, and addiction.

Jasper loved their kisses too. It was so much the two together that made Jasper happy as it did Alice, but the fact that it was Alice. Her perfect little red lips, pulled together as they were wrapped in his. Her small mouth moving with his in the right time with the right sort of feeling. Her smooth tongue against his, diving together.

They both loved to kiss each other. But what they especially enjoyed, like anyone else, was sex together.

They finished undressing each other immediately and got right down to business, Jasper on top, grasping the newly mended headboard, and Alice digging her nails into his back.

Alice loved how sex didn't hurt like it did the first time. Of course, her first time had been quite amazing, but the pain was distinct in her memories of it. In the memories of sex after her first time, pleasure was more evident than any sort of pain. Alice was even completely sure there wasn't any pain at all in all of the times after her first.

The two fucked into the deep hours of the night. It was finally around one that they quit, exhausted. Jasper fell asleep immediately while Alice lay awake, drained and expectant.

She was waiting for Emmett.

For the next hour, Alice kept her eyes glued to the little alarm clock on the bedside table, watching the green block letters shift one at a time every sixty seconds.

And it was the worst form of torture Alice could imagine. She was not one for time or waiting, and every second was agony.

Finally, the last second was up, and it was officially two o'clock in the morning.

Alice leapt out of bed. Jasper shifted, but remained asleep. It reminded Alice he was still there. She silently tiptoed out of the room, closing the door quietly and firmly. She continued to tiptoe through the living room and out of the front door. She waited on the stone steps, in the darkness of the moonless and starless night, patiently.

More time passed and it crippling to Alice.

Finally, almost half an hour after she had sat upon the stone steps, a figure walked up to her. She was half-asleep, so she was rather surprised when a figure she hadn't noticed before said her name, shook her shoulder, and thrust something in her face.

"Who are you?" she asked groggily, rubbing the sleep from eyes and stretching.

"Emmett. There's your medicine. I'm going home; I am beat. Longest day, er, night at work. I'm getting home and then right to my nice bed. You're welcome. 'Night."

We walked away, his feet crunching atop new fallen snow. Alice woke up and realized what had just happened. She smiled, and rushed into the house. She grabbed two six-packs of beer, and hastened to her room where she rested against a wall and cracked open her first bottle of beer and the orange bottle of prescription pills.

She downed four pills at once and the first bottle of beer with half a bottle of Motrin.

She felt queasy at first, even a little dizzy, but continued on with the same routine. Emmett had stolen for her five bottles of the prescription pills and five bottles of Motrin. She intended to finish them all off. And she was sure it was going to take all night – but it was worth it.

And all night, as she swallowed those pills and guzzled that beer and poured that Motrin down her throat, she couldn't help but to think about that. And the baby. And her future. And . . . Jasper.

It was involuntary as her mind raced on and on about these three specific things until the early hours of the morning. Every second between 3:11 - the moment the first pills fell down her throat - and 5:49, those were the only things on her mind.

_I'm naked . . . I'm numb . . . I'm stupid . . . I'm staying . . . And if Cupid's got a gun, he's shooting . . ._

After the second dose, Alice was feeling dizzy, nauseous, and hot. She had been wearing only a T-shirt to greet Emmett little over an hour ago, but she quickly stripped of it when she began to feel heated. It didn't really help though; she still felt scorched.

Alice was still thinking about Jasper though.

Jasper.

She still felt like he would abandon her. Like she was only a toy to him – a toy he could fiddle with to get his satisfying dose of pleasure and then dispose of when he was done. Fuck her and then blow her off while she was sleeping and toking up. He would leave her if she had a child. He was going to leave her anyway. She knew it. It was a gut feeling that told he would leave her soon. Very soon. Maybe tomorrow.

This was wrong though. Jasper cared about her. It was obvious in his words and actions. But Alice was messed up, obviously. She believed things that were not true. Things that were not apparent or even real were as right as ever to her. But Alice had schizophrenia, something no one knew, but was quite obvious. This disorder made her think this way. It made her worry obsessively over things that would never happen - like Jasper leaving her for anything. She believed that. But he never would unless she asked him to. He cared about her, even on the verge of loving her, but Alice didn't know that - she couldn't see it though it was apparent to everyone else who spent time with him and Alice together.

So there she was, Alice realized, naked, drugged, stupid for falling into Jasper, but staying for Jasper, Cupid shooting her with clear bullets every second she was right there.

_Lights black; heads bang . . . You're my drug . . . We live it . . . You're drunk, you need it . . . Real love, I'll give it . . ._

This was truth: Jasper was on the verge of being in love with Alice. Right on the very tip. One more tiny happening between the two, and he could be in love for the very first time with Alice Brandon, who he cared about more than anyone else he knew.

This was not true, though Alice believed it was: he was going to leave her. Soon. Tomorrow, possibly.

The most important truth though was that Alice . . . Alice was . . .

Alice squeezed her eyes shut and guzzled a bear with _six_ pills. Instantly, a headache pounded into her mind.

She didn't want to say it because she knew she'd be hurt in the end if she did, for Jasper was leaving her.

But she loved him. She was in love with him.

She knew it was stupid though.

But she was so addicted to him! Absolutely in love! Like she'd never been before! She had never loved anyone other than her sister, and even that sort of love was different. But she was in love with Jasper, and she was only now realizing it.

In love.

In fucking love!

It was strange but entirely true. It would have been true if she was schizophrenic or not. In love!

It awed Alice, this . . . love. It was a beautiful feeling. It made everything beautiful too. And perfect. Everything was simply perfect in Alice's eyes because she was in love with Jasper.

Of course, he was supposedly leaving her tomorrow, so it was useless to love him. But now that Alice knew the feeling, knew she was in love, she couldn't make herself stop for that. He was her drug. She loved him.

_So, we' re bound to linger on . . . We drink the fatal drop . . . Then love until we bleed . . . Then fall apart in parts . . ._

Alice stuffed six more pills in her mouth and washed them down with Motrin without even realizing what she'd done.

In love with Jasper, though it was pointless. So this was what it felt like to be in love with someone who wouldn't love you back? She'd heard of it so many times in books and movies, but never had she experienced the crippling feeling of it. She felt she had an open gash across her heart, and it was bleeding all the time. She couldn't close the gash. The blood would just keep oozing out. It fell in very large droplets, _plop plop plop_ on the floor beneath Alice's feet, creating the reddest, deepest puddle anyone had ever bled for anyone else before.

She could feel the gash ripping her chest.

The walls were ripping too. The very color of the four walls that surrounded Alice were being torn across in scary, jagged black lines that went on indefinitely. Alice was not frightened though. Instead, she chugged half a bottle of Motrin, and watched the lightbulbs in the ceiling burst, sending sparks flying everywhere.

_You wasted your times . . . On my heart . . . You've burned . . . And if bridges gotta fall, then you'll fall, too . . ._

Alice watched her vision turn from the normal, adjusted, half-lighted view of the room to very dim, dark and unstable. She thought it was the popping lightbulbs around her, but it wasn't. They weren't really popping after all. They hadn't even been on.

So she sullenly popped some more pills. Her vision grew darker. The walls were still ripping, but every second the slashes became wider and shadier. The lightbulbs continued to pop incessantly, their bright gold sparks flying all about the room.

Then Alice's eyes darted to Jasper's sleeping form.

There he lay, sleeping, naïve, innocent. He was completely unaware of the bursting lightbulbs and tearing walls. He was sleeping soundly, curled into a ball, his back to Alice, his back's muscles slightly expanding every time he took a breath.

He didn't know she loved him.

Alice sighed, her eyeballs rolled around in her skull, taking in the tearing walls and bursting bulbs. She took her last swig of beer, and rose, ignoring the destruction about her.

She glided over to the bathroom. She stepped in, and instantly, the room began to shake. The tiles from the walls chipped off and fell to the floor, splintering. Little flecks of plaster were falling and floating in the full bathtub. The mirror shattered the second Alice passed it as she silently slithered over to the now overflowing bathtub.

Alice peered in and saw herself, floating beneath the water, eyes wide open and unseeing, mouth sewn shut with glass.

She did not gasp. She did not sigh. Instead, her eyes filled with horror, and she backed away from the tub, back to the door. Then she turned and ran back into the bedroom.

_Doors slam . . . Lights black . . . You're gone . . . Come back . . . Stay gone . . . Stay clean . . . I need you . . . To need me . . ._

Alice hurled herself at Jasper's side. She did not dare touch him, for fear he would wake to all of the destruction.

Alice glanced up once, and the window opposite her shattered immediately. Snow and white rain pounded into the room, the wind ushering them. Jasper still did not wake.

She sank to her knees, her head spinning. She locked her fingers as her fingers continued to tremble. Her skin was so cold. Her stomach was so sick. Her head was so absent. She did not feel well. But that why she was on her knees at Jasper's side, begging him to wake up and save her. Even if he didn't love her.

She tried to open her frosted blue lips.

Then it culminated.

Her eyes rolled back into her skull, her fingers relaxed, and she collapsed onto the floor beneath her.

At the same time, Jasper awoke, startled. He didn't know why he'd woken so suddenly, but he had. And he turned around just in time to see Alice, falling to the ground.

_Now we're bound to linger on . . . We drink the fatal drop . . . Then love until we bleed . . . Then fall apart in parts . . ._

**Couldn't have done this without the Skins Season 2 trailer. Really, it's amazing, and its metaphor for the series (if you watch) is absolutely fantastic. Go watch it, seriously. Just type SKINS SEASON 2 TRAILER into the YouTube search bar, and watch any of them that pull up. You'll make the connections between it and this chapter, and feel awed by my interpretation:) Kidding, but still, watch it. It's beautiful, and the most artistic, creative trailer I've ever seen for anything. Just type SKINS SEASON 2 TRAILER into the search bar on YouTube, and watch any of them. DO IT!!!**

**Oh, and don't forget to review. Tell me about the trailer in one, if you watched:) Tell me how much you love Skins/wanna watch Skins too! Oh, and critique me too, critique is always good:)**


	14. Woods

**Oh my god, this song that I'm using, Woods, is like, one of the most beautiful songs in the world. It repeats this one stanza each time, but in a different way each time, and it's beautiful. I'm always sort of awed when I hear because the song really is just amazing:) Just read/listen to the lyrics, and you'll understand it!**

**Also, the artist, Bon Iver, is going to be on the NEW MOON SOUNDTRACK! Woohoo! So maybe, if we're lucky, this song'll be on it! And come on, how fitting for New Moon is this song, huh? Once again, just read the lyrics, and you'll understand:)**

_I'm up in the woods . . ._

Alice's eyes were rolled back in her head, revealing the whites of her eyes, though her red veins blotted the white, making them turn red. She was shaking convulsively, her muscles twitching. She was not in control of her actions. Foam was spilling from her ajar mouth.

But still, she was completely conscious. She felt and saw everything that was going on. She saw the bursting lightbulbs, peeling walls, and shattering glass that was not there. Her mind was racing every second with the most coherent thoughts she'd ever had.

She had overdosed.

She was going to die.

Jasper was awake.

The baby inside her was dead.

She'd never had thoughts so clear. Everything was obvious. Everything was easily comprehended, like never before.

Alice felt like she'd never really seen anything before that moment when her thoughts were corrected.

Too bad she knew she was going to die.

_I'm down on my mind . . . _

Jasper saw Alice on the ground, and immediately began to panic.

Alice. His Alice. Dying.

She was dying right there in front of him.

Jasper's eyes filled with sorrow and horror when he realized what was happening. He ran out of the room, and called for Edward and Bella. No one answered. They were not home yet.

He grabbed the gray home phone on the couch, and dialed 911. But the buttons did not dial. The bill for phone service had not been paid, due to Edward's lack of income.

Jasper was panting and sweating with fear. He hastened back to the bedroom. He picked up Alice tenderly in his arms, and laid her on the bed. She was dying. He could see it in her widened eyes. He had to help her. But there was no way that he could, it seemed.

Jasper kissed her forehead, and ran out of the room. He burst into the streets in only his boxers. There was no one, it was dark, and snow was turning his bare feet blue.

He sprinted over to Emmett and Rosalie's apartment. He knew he shouldn't leave Alice alone, dying, in the apartment, but he had to find her help as fast as he could.

_I'm building a still . . ._

"Rosalie! Emmett!" Jasper cried as he raced up the building staircase, skipping three or four at a time, desperate to get up to their room as quick as he possibly could.

He flew into their room, panting and sweating still, and grabbed their home phone that was placed comfortably in its holder. He dialed 911 with shaky fingers, and put the phone to his ear.

"Hello, New York Police Department, what is your emergency?" a female operator answered in a bored, robotic tone.

"Please, Alice is dying!" Jasper shouted into the phone. It was only then, as he spoke to the operator, that Jasper realized he was actually crying. Tears were gathered in his eyes. His cheeks were wet and glistening with the dampness. He was weeping for Alice.

"Is this _Alice_ the one who has an emergency?"

"_Yes!_ Obviously! She's fucking dying! Now please help her!"

"Alright sir, please calm down. Where are you and Alice currently? We need to send an ambulance."

A tiny part of Jasper relaxed, but he was still tense, crying, sweating, and panting for fear Alice would not make it. He was scared for Alice because he thought he might be in . . .

"_Alright, what the fuck is going on_?" someone yelled from another room in the apartment.

Jasper turned around, and saw Emmett swagger in, his face a very deep red, caused by his anger, in only boxers, just like Jasper. Rosalie came in after him, her blonde hair unkempt, and her face clean of makeup, in a nightgown. She hid behind him until she realized it was Jasper, and told Emmett to stop. "He's crying," she said calmly. Then she turned back to Jasper, and walked toward him. "Are you all right? What's happened? Is everything okay? Who's on the phone?"

She placed a comforting hand on his shoulder. Jasper sighed and said to her quickly, "Alice is dying. I needed to call 911, and the phone in Edward and Bella's apartment didn't work, and I needed to use somebody's, so I'm using yours. Rosalie, she is_ dying_."

Rosalie gasped. The female operator on the other line was chanting, "Hello? Hello? Sir? Are you still on the line, sir?"

Jasper sighed. "Where are we?" he asked, exasperated.

Rosalie took the phone from him, and began to explain calmly to the operator, the receiver pressed close to her lips, "Yes, operator, we need an ambulance. We're on 1875 Orchid Street. Our friend is dying." Rosalie held the phone away from her lips. "Jasper, go next door and comfort Alice. Tend to her. If she's still conscious, she's probably scared." Jasper nodded, and turned to the door, but Rosalie stopped him first. She wiped his cheek. "Don't cry. Everything will be alright, okay?"

Jasper's eyes filled to the top with sorrow, and he turned quickly, sprinting back to the apartment.

When he had made it, we raced to Alice's bedside. He kneeled beside her, and held her chilled hands in his.

Fresh tears gathered in Jasper's eyes. It was written all over Alice's beautifully angelic little face: she was going to die. Alice was going to die, and nothing could stop it anymore.

Jasper began to quietly sob. He pressed his cheek to their united hands, and whispered a tearful, "Alice, I'm sorry . . ." Then he kissed her frozen fingers, and wept.

_**To slow down the time . . .**_

With her vision quickly fading, skin's temperature dropping every second, and mind spinning faster and faster, it was a miracle how Alice could think so straightly still.

Her perception of touch was strong as well. She felt Jasper's heat warm her up when he wrapped her frosty fingers in his calloused ones. And she felt the wetness of tears from his eyes against her fingers when he rested his cheek against their hands.

It was then that Alice realized Jasper would never ever, not in a millions years, leaver her for anything.

Tears slowly began to well in her own eyes. She tried desperately to open her quivering little lips, a confession on the tip of her tongue, dying to be let free of its deep confines.

She got them open just enough for a good, strong breath to pass between her colorless lips successfully. So, she tried urgently to breathe to Jasper her little confession, "I . . . I . . ."

Jasper's head rose, hearing the small sound. He saw Alice's tiny lips open, a quiet sound passing through them that sounded like "I." He smiled a little bit, and moved his face so it was right in front of her, their united fingers the only barrier between them.

"Yes? I?" he prompted her, his voice cracking.

Then a tear slipped from one of Alice's blue eyes. But it wasn't like a normal tear. This tear was actually a drop of . . . _blood_._ Alice's blood_. Dark red, thick, and streaming. More of Jasper's tears fell when he saw Alice's own blood begin to pour from her eyes like teardrops.

"I lo . . . lo . . . v . . . y . . . you . . ." Alice confessed, her thick blood continuing to fall from her frantic eyes.

Jasper's whole body went into shock. "I . . . love . . . you?" he asked her, his brow furrowing as he unknowingly gripped onto the tiny fingers in his fists just a little bit tighter.

She nodded. Jasper thought he saw the corners of mouth turn upward in a small smile. But in the next second, her eyes burst open, redness blotching the whites of her eyes. One last spastic shake rolled through her body, causing her muscles to jerk about. A thin trail of blood fell from the corner of her mouth, meeting with a trail from her eye. Her mouth opened all the way, and a ghost of a scream she should have uttered as she fell minutes ago tumbled from her lips weakly.

Her vision turned black. Her hearing was switched off. Her speech was muted. And her mind went blank.

Then she was gone.

Jasper jumped up to his feet. He heard sirens silently go off in the background, but he paid no attention to them. He could only focus on Alice. "Alice? _Alice_? _ALICE?!_" he screamed frantically, his voice cracked, as he stared down at her motionless body. "_ALICE!_"

**So sad :(**

**Tell me so in a REVIEW! Because reviews are love, and I want more love! :)**


	15. How To Disappear Completely

**Okay, this has to be really intense and emotional. I needed to get myself in the mood many a times. Just warning you now:)**

**God, this is, like, the saddest song ever created. Just look at the lyrics! And with that slow acoustic guitar . . . Oh, Radiohead! Do you see what you do to me?! Oh, what you do to me . . . :)**

_That there, that's not me . . . I go where I please . . . I walk through walls . . . I float down the liffey . . . _

_I'm not here . . . This isn't happening . . . I'm not here . . . I'm not here . . . _

_In a little while . . . I'll be gone . . . The moment's already passed . . . Yeah, it's gone . . . _

_I'm not here . . . This isn't happening . . . I'm not here . . . I'm not here . . ._

_Strobe lights and blown speakers . . . Fireworks and hurricanes . . . _

_I'm not here . . . This isn't happening . . . I'm not here . . . I'm not here . . . _

Everything else around Jasper was either distorted, distant, or the volume turned way down. He could only hear his desperate voice as he called Alice's name repeatedly.

So, he did not hear or see the sirens. He didn't hear Rosalie call his name. He didn't even hear the paramedics stampede into the room. He only realized anything else was going on in the world when Emmett grabbed his forearms and pulled him away from Alice's side so the paramedics could lay Alice on a gurney and wheel her away.

"No! _No! No!_ NO! Please!" Jasper cried as he tried to struggle away from Emmett's indestructible grip.

Jasper continued to struggle as Alice was being wheeled away from him. But he couldn't bare to watch her leaving. He had to be with her, but she was being taken away from. Ripped away. It was like every fiber of his being was being pulled apart viciously. Like his heart was being strangled. Like his universe had finally collapsed.

This couldn't be happening. None of this could actually be _happening_, right? This wasn't him; he wasn't here. This was wasn't happening. This was someone else's problem. That was someone else's love dying in the gurney, being shuttled away from him and to the hospital. This was really going on. None of it was. And he wasn't really here!

Jasper stopped resisting.

He wasn't really _here_. This was a dream, a nightmare, of some sort. He wasn't there, he couldn't be. This was too much for a human to bare. No one could actually live through this, could they?

That's why he wasn't there. Because this was impossible. This happening of Alice dying, wasn't happening, it couldn't. It was impossible! So none of this was happening, and he wasn't really here.

Emmett put Jasper back down. Rosalie immediately rushed to his side, her arms wrapped around his shoulders in a warm embrace. "Jasper, I'm so, so sorry. I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry . . ." she chanted to him calmly, trying to relief his pain with small apologies.

Emmett rested his large hand on Jasper's shoulder. "I'm so sorry, man. This is really terrible," he offered.

Jasper wiped his face with the back of his hand. That was pointless of him to waste his tears. After all, none of this was _actually_ happening. None of it _had_ happened either.

Jasper smiled slightly, and brushed away new forming tears from his eyes. "Where's Alice?" he asked, his voice completely relaxed.

Rosalie and Emmett exchanged worried glances.

"Uhm, Jasper, sweetie, she's going to the hospital. The ambulance just took her away," Rosalie tried to explain to him delicately so he wouldn't break down again. Her grip on his shoulders tightened.

Jasper tittered. "Stop playing along. I know none of this is happening. I know I'm not _really _here. But my dream version of Alice must be somewhere. And I need to entertain myself until I wake up again and see that everything is alright." Jasper sighed shakily, and tried to beam. "I'm going to tell her I love her when I wake up, you know."

"But, Jasper, you're not . . . you're not asleep, sweetie. This is real. This is all happening, and you _are_ really here," Rosalie tried to explain to him, worry rising in her voice.

Jasper sighed, rolled his eyes, and shrugged her off his shoulders. He then strolled out of the room, in search of Alice.

But he didn't get much farther than the threshold when Rosalie took his hand, and pleaded, "Please Jasper, stop this! _You know this is happening_! You can't just pretend Alice has been taken to the hospital. You can't pretend you're not here!"

Jasper yanked his hand away from hers, and held it away. "_But I'm not_! Alice is not gone. This is a nightmare, and I figure that out, so just stop playing along. Watch, I can walk through walls if I want to because this has to be dream!" Jasper hissed at her.

Jasper turned and walked straight into a wall. Instead of going through though, he ended up with a bruised forehead. Rosalie rushed over, holding Jasper supportively, and told Emmett to go get some ice. "See, this isn't a dream. You can't go through walls."

Jasper's eyes squinted shut with pain as he hand flew to his forehead. "You did that . . . on purpose! I don't know how, but you somehow made me unable to walk through walls in my _own dream_!"

Rosalie sighed, and cried, "Jasper, stop this nonsense! This is real! You're here! And you can't pretend like this is a dream. There is no waking up later. You're already awake."

Emmett pressed a bag of ice to Jasper's swollen forehead. "Kid, you need to stop fighting reality," Emmett continued for Rosalie, "and understand Alice really might die tonight."

The room held in a breath.

"But . . ." Jasper tried to reason with them, though no words of resistance followed his single "but".

"Don't we all wish that hadn't just happened?" Rosalie continued after Emmett. "Don't we all wish that Alice hadn't taken those pills? That it hadn't lead to this? That she was all right?"

"But we can only wish," said Emmett, pressing the bag of ice against Jasper's sweating skin.

"There's no turning back the clock –"

"– she really took those pills –"

"– and she could really be hurt –"

"_Wait_," Jasper interrupted loudly, pulling away from the couple and to the other side of the bedroom. He broke into a sweat. "What are you two talking about? About the pills? What pills?"

Emmett and Rosalie exchanged a glance again, though this time, the glance they shared was uncomfortable.

"She didn't . . . tell you about it, dear?" Rosalie asked, sudden innocence painted in her wide eyes.

Jasper shook his head. The couple shared another uncomfortable glance.

Then Emmett sighed, and began to explain to Jasper, "Alice came to us yesterday. She asked me if I could get her these pills. I thought she was going to pop them. I guess she overdosed."

"What pills?" No one answered this question at first. "_What pills_?" Jasper repeated vociferously.

"Misoprostol," Rosalie blurted out through clenched teeth. "It was Misoprostol she asked for."

Jasper's mouth hung open. He grabbed Rosalie's arm, pulling her toward his glaring hazel eyes. "Alice doesn't have ulcers," he hissed. "But that pill is suppose to kill fetal babies."

"Uh . . ." Rosalie muttered, her eyes widening with fear.

"Alice was pregnant!" Jasper yelled in her face. "_She was trying to kill the baby! She was trying to kill the fucking baby with that medicine you gave her, you stupid cunt!_" Jasper began to shake her, Rosalie screaming and writhed, desperate to free herself.

Then Emmett punched Jasper, and he immediately relaxed his grip enough for Rosalie to scurry away and hide behind Emmett.

Jasper staggered and fell against the wall, sliding down it to a sitting position upon the floor. But Emmett picked him up by his forearms, and hissed at him, "Get a hold of yourself. It wasn't Rosalie's fault; it was my fault. I gave Alice the fucking pills." Emmett shoved Jasper against the wall. Rosalie gasped. "Don't you ever touch or speak that way to Rosalie ever again, okay? You got that, you fucking asshole?"

Jasper's head rolled around and to the side. A teardrop slid down his cheek. "Alice was trying to kill our baby," he whispered tearfully. He squeezed his eyes shut with the pain.

Rosalie scampered out from behind Emmett and squatted next to Jasper's side. Emmett did not stop her from doing this, but lay a protective hand upon her shoulder anyway. "Your . . . baby?"

Jasper nodded without looking at her.

"She was pregnant?"

He nodded again.

"And those pills Emmett gave to her kill unborn babies?"

He nodded once more.

"She was trying to abort the baby," Emmett concluded gravely, his grip on Rosalie tightening.

Jasper's head sank, and then he whispered as tears continued to stream just as steadily, "Yes . . . my baby . . . Alice's and I's . . . _baby_. I wouldn't have been angry if she kept the baby. I wouldn't have run away or anything. I would've stayed, raised it with her. I don't know how, but I would've. I don't understand why Alice felt like she had to kill our child . . ."

"She might have been scared," Rosalie offered.

"Why didn't she tell me? She lied . . . she told me she took a test, and it came up negative. She told me she took three. She told me she wasn't pregnant, but she _was_! Or she wouldn't have taken those pills . . ." Jasper continued to piece the puzzle together.

"Maybe she knew she was just too young," Emmett presented gruffly, not looking to Jasper.

"Why did she lie? Why would she lie to me?" Jasper whispered.

"Maybe she didn't know another way out of her predicament," Rosalie insisted calmly.

"But why would she just . . . _lie_ to me? I . . . I . . ." Jasper struggled. Then Alice's final words floated into his thoughts.

'_I lo . . . lo . . . v . . . y . . . you . . .' _were the breathy last words she'd murmured to Jasper just seconds before her eyes turned back into her skull, and she had left him.

Jasper took in a lungful of air abruptly before he knew he had done so. Then his eyes filled with sadness, and new tears spilled over silently. "I love her," he whispered in agony, the pain torturing his words. He shut his eyes. "I'm in love with Alice."

Then tears filled Rosalie's eyes too. Even Emmett's vision became a little bleary with the saline fluid.

Jasper laid his head on the floor and began to weep quietly.

He was in love with Alice, that much was absolute. And she could quite possibly die that night.

Now, Jasper would give up anything for this not be happening, for him to not really be there. But his eyes were opened too wide for him to shut them again, and pretend he'd seen nothing.

_Oh, Alice_, his thoughts pounded. _Why? Why have you done this to me? I love you. I love you more than anything in the world. I love you so much, it consumes me. I cannot even breathe anymore because my love for you is taking all the room in my lungs. I can't even think straight with you gone. I can't live when you are not._

The room got eerily silently.

Jasper lifted his head. Suddenly, everything was just too quiet. He glanced at Rosalie and Emmett, who were staring at him with the saddest eyes, tears flowing. It was then that Jasper realized he'd said that all out loud rather than only in his thoughts.

He rose suddenly, and pulled on a shirt and jeans. Rosalie wiped away her tears. "What are you doing?" she asked stuffily, her overflowing sinuses causing her words to sound thick.

"Getting dressed," Jasper replied gravely.

"Why?" Emmett asked. He sounded like he was trying to suppress the thickness of tears in his own words.

"We're going to the hospital," Jasper said. He momentarily paused to stand against the pain that pounded against him when he said those words. A stifled, frightened breath passed across his lips.

He tried to smother this pain by walking out, ignoring Rosalie and Emmett on the floor. But they rose quickly and followed him.

Jasper strode quickly over to the front door. He was about to yank the it open when it was suddenly opened for him from the other side, revealing a lost-looking Edward Cullen.

The two men stared at each other for a moment before Edward muttered, "What's going on?"

Jasper looked down. Emmett and Rosalie looked to each other. But Jasper sighed, and whispered, "Alice . . . she overdosed. She's going to die. We're going to the hospital."

Edward gasped, his empty eyes suddenly filled with life. "When? When did this happen?" he demanded.

"She was taken away a few minutes ago," Rosalie answered quietly from behind Jasper's shoulder.

"I'll come," Edward confirmed. "I'll come . . ."

So, the four wandered out of the door, and into the snowy streets. The sun was just coming over the horizon as they began to trek down the street to St. Mary's Hospital, which was more than a few blocks away, but they had no other way to get there.

The beautiful colors of a sunrise streaked the sky, stretching over the white, unbothered snow.

The scene would seem beautiful to any bystander who was just looking about: four friends, walking down the street, seemingly normal, and a wonderful sunrise extended across the sky, new fallen snow covering the ground upon which they marched together.

But to someone who knew, it was a terribly opposing scene. Devastation had occurred upon the friends, and the sunrise was the opposite of the feelings swirling about within them.

No one was cold. No one was worried. Everyone was numb. Everyone just needed to get to that hospital. Everyone just needed to get to St. Mary's. Jasper just needed to see Alice.

It was scary to understand all of this was real. Jasper so wished he could just shut his eyes, and pretend that it wasn't happening. But it was. His mind was too knowledgeable about the whole thing to allow Jasper to just pretend he wasn't even really there.

Yes, it was very frightening to understand it was happening, he was there, but he had to. For Alice.

All for Alice Brandon.

**Reviews would be REALLY, REALLY great!**

**I really want to know your opinion on Jasper, by the way:) So go ahead and spill your GUTS about him in a review! NOW! Just go do it, okay? It would be super great! :)**


	16. Slow Pony Home

**Fuck man, this song (Slow Pony Home by the Weepies) is so amazing like, you don't even know, okay! I love it to death3 It goes up there with Nude, okay! Yes, it is that important to me:)**

**So here we are, close to ending this A/J fic. Only a few more chapters before the fun is over! (I didn't know if I should've put a :) or a :( there^^ . . .)**

**Anyway, yay! :)**

_And all that time, I felt just fine . . . I held so many people in my suitcase heart . . . That I had to let the whole thing go . . . It was taken by the wind and snow . . . And I still didn't know that I was waiting . . . For a girl on a slow pony home . . ._

"_Fuck_. How are we going to pay these fucking medical bills?" Edward shouted the first time he tore open the letter.

Jasper didn't blame him. With had two friends at St. Mary's, and the lacking income, that was a question everyone found themselves asking periodically throughout the months.

Jasper only cared if Alice was okay though.

He didn't care about the money and the expenses. He'd do anything just to know Alice was going to wake up one day. Why? Well, that was a question everyone _but_ Jasper asked themselves periodically as well. Jasper didn't need to ask himself that silly question though: he already knew the answer to it.

The answer?

Jasper was sure it was always changing.

Some days, the answer was her hair: the way the strands shone in sunlight. The way the limp spikes drooped around her motionless face. The pitch-black color of it. Her hair was beautiful, washed or unwashed, straight or limp. Some days, it was her hair.

Some days, the answer was her eyes: those big blue, doe-like orbs that never moved with the same life they used to. The radiant deep cerulean color of them. The wide, innocent shape. The way, sometimes, if Jasper was lucky, a glimpse of light would dash across them in the perfect way, and they would sparkle as if they were alive once more. Some days, it was just her beautiful blue eyes.

Some days, the answer was her stunning, ruby red lips: oh, that little flower! It truly seemed like a red little flower upon her visage. The most beautiful crimson color painted the blossom beautifully, like a doll's, but more beautiful than any type of lipstick or coating. They were full and supple, but not plump, or skinny, but just in between. And the uncontrived, sheer, natural look and shape of the tiny flower of her mouth made Jasper want to kiss it every single time he looked upon it. Some days, it was just her wonderfully scarlet lips.

Some days, the answer was her skin: the pale, sheer, smooth flesh that surfaced her body. Every time Jasper glanced upon it, it conjured up memories of caressing and kissing it. With the pale but silvery, and uncannily beautiful sheen and natural smoothness of the flesh, how could anyone _not_ picture scenes of caressing and kissing it? Some days, it was just that stunning skin of hers.

And some days, it was simply her gorgeous body: her tiny frame could drive anyone crazy. The thin bones that often jutted from her silvery skin were the tiniest bones Jasper had ever seen. They were smooth beneath the skin, perfect and small. He especially loved her collarbone though. It was graceful, little, and long; Jasper loved to trail his rough fingers along the fine bone that protruded from her wondrous skin. Some days, it was just the beauty of her tiny body.

But most days, it was her heart: how such a feeble beat could carry a person through comatose mystified Jasper. It was so weak, but so strong: Alice could be anywhere – in her mind, at least – but her gentle heartbeat kept her alive and from the brink of death. Though it was as frail as Alice's thin bones, it managed to keep Alice alive somehow. And every day, Jasper thanked the heartbeat for that. He couldn't do anything. Edward couldn't do anything. Not Rosalie or Emmett could do anything. And the doctors could only do so much before it was up to the heartbeat to keep this girl going. And it always pulled through. It was amazing. It amazed everyone: Jasper, Edward, Emmett, Rosalie, and even the doctors, who claimed never to have seen such a persistent heartbeat. And especially from the heart of someone who was almost constantly drugged or smoking.

It was an amazing struggle and story. Jasper would love to tell it over and over again to absolutely anyone who listened, but he was almost never outside of the hospital.

After realizing he was in love with Alice, and that it was almost certain she was going to die, Jasper felt an odd need to be around her at all times. It wasn't a clinging need; it was more of a need to protect. He wanted Alice to live, and he felt like by being there with her while she fought her battle, he was somehow helping her to win.

Bella was a different story completely. She wasn't fighting to save her life, but to conquer all of her "demons". Because it was required by the hospital (the amount of drugs in Bella's system shocked them), Edward could not pull her out it.

She stayed regularly in a hospital room that was on the opposite side of the building from Alice, though only to help with her anorexia. They claimed she was making progress, but not enough to be checked out of the hospital on her own. That was one of the "demons" she was supposedly conquering in rehabilitation. She was also expected to conquer her drug addiction to her famous, favorite painkiller: a special blend of Codeine, Xanax, and the "ever so deadly" combination of Morphine and Percocet. Her doctors claimed this was truly one of the most lethal drug mixtures they had ever seen, it was no wonder she'd overdosed, and Bella should be kept far from it in the future. However, as soon as she got back home, we all knew that would not be the case.

So, Bella was not battling for her life as Alice was every second of every day of every month she was there. At least Bella continued to get better bit by bit. Every ounce she gained was celebrated, every question answered correctly was praised. She was doing fine, her doctors said. She could be discharged in a few days, her doctors said.

No one ever said that about Alice.

Jasper asked the same questions everyday. Usually, the response was the same as well. But this morning, from Doctor Platt, Jasper got a sort of different answer than expected.

It was bright and early: Jasper had spent all night thinking about what he would say to Alice when she woke up. He rehearsed lines, went over dialogue, and even wrote a poem that was complete rubbish. He was sleepy, but not sleepy enough to miss Doctor Platt's 6:30 AM checkup on her most time-consuming patient, Alice Brandon.

Doctor Esme Platt was sort of attractive: she had wonderful caramel-colored hair that was long, wavy, and shiny. It curled around her face and fell to the middle of her back. She had dull green eyes that were not terribly spectacular, but merely _nice_. Her skin was nice, tan, and even. She had a small frame and was quite short, but she seemed muscular in stature. Like Jasper concluded, she was only fairly attractive.

Her husband was Doctor Carlisle Platt, a tall man with sharp features, smooth blonde hair, blue eyes, and also Bella's own attending physician. This pair of married doctors was said to be the absolute kindest couple of doctors in all of St. Mary's Hospital.

Doctor Esme, as Jasper preferred to call her, walked into the room right on time, white lab coat flowing and clipboard in hand. She smiled at Jasper, who was in the same spot he was in every morning, the edge of Alice's bed, and greeted him in her serious but motherly tone, "Good morning, Mr. Whitlock. How are you this fine Tuesday morning?"

Jasper smiled back cordially and then replied, "Very good, actually. Tired though. I stayed up all night thinking about what I'll say to Alice when she finally wakes up." He cast a longing glance at her still face before returning his eyes to Doctor Esme.

She smiled wider, and then sat beside him, something she hadn't really done before. "Jasper," she said, "I know you love her –"

"I do!" It was compulsive, the way Jasper had to confirm the way he loved Alice whenever someone even mentioned it.

"– but some things stay the same."

Jasper's heart did not sink the way it used to when Doctor Esme would tell him these things. So instead of spiraling back to that, Jasper decided to ask the same question he did every morning, "When do you think she'll wake up, Doctor Esme?"

"Do you know how long Alice has been here, like this, Jasper?" Doctor Esme countered.

He knew. "Six months and eight days."

"That's a very long time, I think." Jasper nodded in agreement. Doctor Esme smiled warmly at him, just like a real mother would. "Maybe it's just the right time, yeah?"

Jasper looked up at her the minute she said those words, hope shining in his eyes. "Do you mean – ?"

Doctor Esme shrugged, smiled, and then proceeded to do her regular tests. She checked the IVs, various tubes, medicine levels on the random machine in the corner, and so on. Jasper never really knew what she _really_ checked up on so routinely, but whatever it was, it seemed very vital to her and Alice that she did.

All day after that short exchanged with Doctor Esme, Jasper could not help but to wonder if Alice would ever wake up. He loved her, he would fight for her, he would stay with her, he would go wherever she went, and only deviating when she told him to. But this one time, he allowed himself to think about the seconds that could stretch on forever that Alice would be spending in a coma.

Jasper sighed, and laid down next to Alice on the bed. He turned, and looked at her frozen face.

It was perfect, that was already known, but the way she was positioned, the way her expression appeared was somewhat horrifying. Her mouth was poised wide open, as if in the middle of a bloodcurdling scream. Her eyes were stretched broadly as well, fear transfixed in the blue orbs. Every inch of her face read, "Death", which she was narrowly escaping as Jasper watched her.

Jasper sighed, and reached beneath the covers of the bed. He found her stationary hand, but immediately recoiled.

The wintriness of her skin was almost unbelievable. It was like ice. Her fingers were not blue, but they should have been! Her fingers could have literally been carved from ice in they way that her fingers stayed permanently fixed in a position that made them appear as if claws and in the way that they_ felt_ like genuine ice too.

Jasper didn't care though. Of course, the feeling had scared him at first, not knowing what to expect and all, but he still braved it and wound his own fingers around hers.

This was the first time he'd touched her in six months and eight days. He had so longed to caress her skin, kiss her cheek, hold her hand, or stroke her neck, but never had he ever done it before. It was a compulsive thing though: he believed that, if he touched her, if anyone touched her, she would die. It was odd how he felt this way, but he indulged it by disallowing himself, Edward, Emmett, and Rosalie from touching her. He even begged Doctor Esme and the nurses to do their best to not come in contact with her skin. But because Jasper was suddenly thinking about if she would ever wake up, that fear went away. A larger one replaced it. The one where he feared if she would ever wake again.

So, he laced her fingers with his, and sighed. He stared up at the ceiling that Alice herself had been staring at for six months and eights days now. It wasn't very attractive, but Jasper couldn't look away: he was too wrapped up in his thoughts about _Alice_.

Jasper could only think about his life _minus _Alice. What would he _do_? He couldn't go back to the apartment with Edward and Bella, that was a given; that place reminded him too much of Alice, and he could never sleep in that bedroom where her horrific scene had played. So where to? Home? No, never; that place would be a living hell if he finally came back after six months _without_ being fixed. Well, maybe his original location first, St. Paul's Mental Institute for Men, and then home? Maybe that would do, but Jasper couldn't see himself back in the hands of his parents, Charlotte and Randall Whitlock. They didn't really want him, so why burden them with his existence? They were probably overjoyed he hadn't shown up yet anyway. So what to do then? Jasper could only think of death.

Death was a considerable option though, in his mind. He would be with Alice in the afterlife no doubt, he'd free of problems and parents, and he could spend all of eternity with Alice. He couldn't imagine a better paradise than that.

So was it settled? Death? It _was_ the most logical . . .

But he wasn't just sure. He wasn't absolutely sure by any standard. Something about diving into the black abyss of death so abruptly didn't seem so very appealing to Jasper.

But he saw no other options.

Death it was? His decision was too foggy.

"Hey, Jasper!" someone yelled from just beyond the threshold to Alice's room. Of course, Edward swaggered in. "Good morning, kiddo – I knew you'd be awake. Come with me."

Jasper yawned, "Why?"

Edward rolled his eyes. "Did you get any sleep last night?" Jasper shook his head. Edward rolled his eyes again, unimpressed. "Whatever, kid, just come with me, okay?"

Jasper groaned and then got up from Alice's bed. He waved goodbye to her, and then followed Edward out into the lobby of the sixth floor, the floor Alice was staying on, the floor reserved for people who could be there their whole lives.

He waved to the five nurses that often attended to Alice: Nurses Ambra, Emma, Lydia, Selene, and Sage.

They went down the elevator to the first floor, and marched into the main lobby of the humongous hospital. Then they hurriedly continued to the very end of the West Corridor, over to where Bella's room was, and therapy sessions usually were.

It saddened Jasper a bit when he realized he'd been at that hospital so long for Alice, that he could name almost every doctor, patient or nurse that passed by him and Edward.

They then took the farthest elevator up to the fourth floor, Bella's floor, and then stopped outside her room very abruptly.

Edward turned to Jasper, grinning smugly, "We're going to cheat Bella out of here today!"

Jasper raised an eyebrow and crossed his arms over his chest. "And how the fuck do you suppose to _cheat _her out here?"

Edward rolled his eyes and pulled him into Bella's room, where she lay sleeping upon her bed. "Today, she's being weighed, like usual. We both know she's still severely underweight. So, we're going to put some weights in her bra today, just to give her the extra boost she needs to be let out of here. It won't be much." Edward produced two disks from his pockets, and flashed them in Jasper's face. Jasper pushed them away.

"They'll notice her boobs look bigger," he countered.

"Fine then! We'll stuff 'em in her panties them, no big deal. We'll bust her out of here one way of another."

Edward grinned again, and then woke Bella. She was groggy as she lifted her eyelids to the morning sunlight and Edward's excited face. She grumbled for him to leave at first, but Edward enthusiastically told her of the plan, and she shot up in bed. She seemed completely overjoyed. She leapt out of bed and threw her arms around Edward. "Oh my god, Edward, today I'm _leaving_?!" she asked as she hugged him.

She pulled away from him, still smiling. He smirked back and replied, "Well, only if it works, but I'm sure it will. They only check pockets, right?" Bella nodded. "Good, them we'll be fine!"

Bella screamed again and jumped out of bed. She turned to Jasper, a wild look in her eye. "Jasper, I'll be let free today!"

Jasper smiled back. "That's so great, isn't it?"

"Of course it is! I can't wait to get back home . . . I haven't seen much farther than the courtyard here in six months. I can't wait to get back to the city, and the clubs, and the parties –"

The door to her room suddenly opened, revealing Doctor Carlisle, as everyone called him. He smiled warmly, like a father, as his eyes swept the room. "Hello, Edward. Hello, Jasper. What are you two doing in here so early? Jasper, I'd expect you to be with Alice, Doctor Esme's patient." Jasper shrugged. Doctor Carlisle turned to see Bella up and awake in the corner. "Miss Bella! What are you doing up so early? You're never awake when I do my morning checkups."

Bella shrugged and blushed. "They woke me up. They were just telling me some news they just leaned about."

Carlisle gripped his clipboard to his chest, and smiled wider. "What news? Anything I know, or should know about?"

Bella shook her head a bit too quickly. "No, no, not at all, Doctor Carlisle. Just about Emmett and Rosalie, if you remember them. Something about a new apartment, that's all, nothing to worry over!"

Doctor Carlisle chuckled and then walked toward the IV machine. Bella gasped. Then he found the IV feeder, unhooked. He turned to face Bella. "Bella, you can't keep unhooking this."

"But I don't _feel_ any different without it."

"Pain is not the reason you're _suppose_ to be wearing this IV. It's very important you keep it on, for your safety."

"If it's not for pain, what's it for?"

"Just some chemicals that you absolutely _need_ in your body, whose ducts were fried dry by all of that painkiller medication mixture you took over the past year or so."

"Bullshit."

"No cursing."

Doctor Carlisle was a stickler for the rules.

Tenderly, he reattached the IV syringe to the inside of her elbow, turned the machine back on, and continued with his normal checks. Everyone stayed put, including Bella, who stayed in her corner, more human than ever as she scoffed in silence.

When Doctor Carlisle had left, Edward produced his weights again, reminding Bella of his plan. "Now, Bella," he said seriously, "I want you to stuff these either in your bra or panties. Drink plenty of water, too. Then go get weighed and tell me how it went!"

Bella squealed, and then wrapped her arms around Edward's neck, and began to kiss him passionately.

Jasper felt a little bit awkward as the two just stood there, obliviously making out, so he offered a timid, "I'm going back to check on Alice. Tell me how your weighing goes, Bella" and then left.

Jasper hurried back to Alice's room. The first thing he noticed though, was that there were no nurses at the Nurses' Station; not Ambra, Emma, Lydia, Selene, or Sage were in sight as Jasper passed the long, winding desk overflowing with papers and binders.

Instantly, he began to worry. Had something happened to another patient, or worse, Alice, that required all of the nurses to leave? Jasper sped up his pace as he rounded the corner.

He could see Alice's door. It was wide open. The number 482, her room number, was shining in the florescent lights above. Jasper broke out into a sweat.

He whipped around the door and into her room, but instantly collided with Nurse Sage's pink-scrubbed back. He heard beeping going off on the other side of the room. Someone who sounded like Doctor Esme was yelling some doctor gibberish near where the beeping was coming from. Jasper was panicking. What was going on?

"Excuse me, Sage! Sage!" Jasper yelled over the words of other nurses and doctors in the room, his voice high with panic.

Sage turned, her cheery face uncharacteristically serious and grave. Jasper's own face instantly sank. "Jasper," she stated in a monotone, her usual jovial tone gone.

Jasper felt his face sink deeper. "Sage, what's going on?"

She turned to let him through to Alice's bedside, a scene not unheard of between Jasper and Alice.

**OH MY GOD!**

**WHAT HAPPENED?!?!?**

**You'll find out next time, which is whenever I decided to post another chapter:)**

**Cheers!**

**Oh, and as usual, don't forget to leave a review or two, or maybe three, or five, or, you know . . . eleven is a good number:)**

**See ya, kiddos!**


	17. The Ice Is Getting Thinner

_And it seems to me . . . There's nowhere we can go . . . With nothing underneath . . . And it saddens me to say . . . But we both know, well, it's true . . . That the ice was getting thinner . . . Under me and you . . . The ice was getting thinner . . . Under me and you . . ._

**Uck . . . the song quote in the last chapter looked all weird . . . sorry about that guys!**

**Anyway, wow, this song The Ice Is Getting Thinner by Death Cab For Cutie is, like, really pretty. And sad. I was surprised, honestly. A friend told me to download it (I had to; this was coming from the friend who only listens to the top ten on Billboard and iTunes . . .), and I did, and I serious love it. It's very sad. And the soft instruments and honest lyrics make it very pretty as well:) I like it! And I hope you do too, or I wouldn't've posted it;) JUST KIDDING I posted it because I thought the last verse fit the chapter! xP**

**Fuck, why is my computer freaking out?!?!? I'm not running anything but iTunes and this Word document! WHAT THE FUCK, MAC COMPUTER?!?**

**Anyway, I know the updates are coming at a staggeringly rapid pace, but I'm trying to get the all done, in like, the dead of night, when I should be sleeping. Your welcome.**

**Here we go . . . !**

Jasper pushed through the crowd of nurses and doctors just in time to hear and see Doctor Esme shout, "_Alice_, don't you quit on me now!" as she pushed the defibrillator to her bare chest. Jasper gasped when he saw Alice's lifeless body jump with the shock.

Jasper whipped around, and looked directly into Nurse Sage's eyes with utter despair. "Sage? What's going on?" he asked her, his voice small and frightened, like a child afraid of a thunderstorm.

She didn't answer.

He turned around again, to Doctor Esme – he did not budge from his spot, merely looked at her – and shouted at her desperately, "Doctor Esme, what is going on?!"

Then the beeping machine next to Doctor Esme distracted Jasper. It was the type you see in movies: it was a white pole with a black monitor as its head. On the black monitor was a faint, neon green grid, and a like-colored line going through it. Every time it beeped, the green line would spike upward, just like in the movies and TV shows. Jasper realized this was watching Alice's heart; he'd seen it before, back when he first began to stay at the hospital with Alice, six months ago. It was always there, beeping in the corner, a suction cup connecting Alice's chest and the machine by wire. But over the past months, Jasper had learned to ignore the annoying beeping it incessantly made. Obviously, he'd learned to disregard it so well though, that the machine and the sound had seemed foreign to him six months later, in this situation.

In the movies and TV shows, the spikes of heartbeat always seemed so _high_ on the monitor. But with Alice, the points seemed to be getting lower and lower with each beat . . .

Jasper gulped, sweat drenching his forehead.

Then as Nurse Selene yelled, "Clear!", her thick Spanish accent coating over the single, shocking word, Jasper realized Alice's heart was failing. They were trying to restart it with the defibrillator.

Jasper felt his breath catch in his throat.

This was the moment that was even more important than her waking: it was the narrow bridge between death and life for her.

Jasper ran his hands through his hair, and started to pant, panicked and frightened. Alice's ice was getting thinner.

He thought he might cry.

But instead, Jasper dropped his head back, hands supporting, doing his best to stifle the tears and sobs. The only thing he heard was his heavy breathing in the few moments his mind could only chant to him, _The ice is getting thinner between us . . ._

Jasper squeezed his eyes shut, and pulled his head back up. The sounds of the hospital returned to his ears quickly, with a very loud _bang_ and _pop_. But Jasper couldn't do or say anything before he looked down at Alice's lifeless body on the bed. He noted her closed eyes – eyes that hadn't been closed in six months.

"The ice is getting thinner between you and me," he informed her, a mirthless chuckle in his last word.

He dropped his hands from his head and then looked back, and took in the scene again.

Doctor Esme was rubbing the two hands of the defibrillator together, and then shocked Alice's heart once more. Jasper's eyes widened, filled with horror at seeing the terrifying scene again, but forced himself not to speak while Doctor Esme was working.

"No! Alice, no!" she shouted.

One long beep pierced the air of the room. Her heart had stopped.

Jasper was surprisingly serene at hearing this fateful sound. But he knew it was just the calm before the storm, when he realized what had just happened had really just happened.

Doctor Esme handed the defibrillator to Nurse Selene, not taking her eyes from Alice's surprisingly peaceful body. Then she covered her back up with her dressing, and sighed.

Jasper came forward silently, and gripped the bedrails, his visage still blank and somewhat calm.

The whole room seemed to be staring at him quietly, holding their breath. "Jasper? Jasper?" a few people murmured, concern coating his name in every whisper of theirs.

But he did nothing in response to these murmurs. Instead he reached his hand forward, and stroked the very tips of his fingers against Alice's smooth and cold skin. Her dead skin. "Gone," he whispered to her. A single tear escaped the corner of his eye.

"Jasper, I . . ." Doctor Esme began, but she stopped herself. A sound had just pierced the air again.

Nurse Selene turned, and checked the black monitor. A single_ beep_ had just erupted from it. She turned it around, and pressed many buttons. But the _beep_ went off again. And again. And again. And again!

Jasper had been staring at the monitor and Selene, but suddenly he felt a hand grip his tightly, perfunctorily, and he was not startled. Instead, he turned around in time to see Alice open her eyes mechanically, as if suddenly recharged rather than awakened.

The room let their breath go and then gasp it right back in when they saw her eyes open.

Alice didn't notice anyone else in the room but Jasper. Her bright blue doe eyes were glued to his face, and his face alone. All else in the room was cut out completely. There was just Jasper.

"Welcome back," he whispered to her, his voice cracked and hoarse, but absolutely overjoyed.

She did not smile. Instead, she sat up in bed, shocking everyone, though no one moved to do anything about it. She then turned mechanically toward Jasper, her beautiful, miniature features blank.

But then something broke onto her face, humanity finally shining through the blank mask she'd only just had. No one knew what it was though. Her mouth appeared to be a cross between a smile and a crying grimace, for her mouth was turned downward like a grimace while crying would, but happiness shown through. And her eyes blinked rapidly, little collections of moisture gathering in the corners, though no one was sure if they were of sorrow or of joy.

But then she sprang forward, and coiled her arms around Jasper's neck and shoulders, hugging him. Jasper was startled at first, but obliged, and wrapped her arms around her waist, hugging her back.

Alice sobbed quietly into his shoulder for a very long time as the nurses and doctors, including Doctor Esme, filed out of the room. Jasper felt her tears douse his T-shirt.

When everyone was gone and the door shut, Alice pulled back, and smiled. Her face was flushed a lovely pink color, but was also very wet. She quickly wiped her hands across her cheeks, though still more tears continued to pour down them.

Then she pulled away, and laid upon her bed again, pulling the covers over her body as she stifled and wiped her face.

They stayed like that for a few moments before the awkwardness began to eclipse Jasper's focus. He had to leave to avoid it and just fill his brain with oxygen again.

Doctor Esme was waiting outside for him.

"Jasper!" she snapped when he'd stepped from the room. "What happened? Is she alright?"

Jasper nodded. "She's fine, but she won't talk to me."

Doctor Esme shrugged, and then walked briskly back into Alice's room, clipboard in hand. She even put on the face she did when she was meeting with new patients for the occasion, though it was clear that a form of happiness was slipping just beneath it.

Jasper staggered over to a bench across from Alice's room. He rested his elbows on his knees and rubbed his eyes. The nurses were observing him as he did so from the Nurses' Station. When he looked up again, he was greeted by their worried stares.

He smiled timidly, and waved. They continued to stare, so Jasper rose and walked over to them. He rested his elbows on the counter, and his face on his balled fists, smiled, and asked, "What?"

Ambra sighed, and seized the papers and folders from her desk, hugging them so her chest. She rolled her eyes and hissed, her Italian accent thick, "What happened after we left? It seemed like as soon as we left, so did you. What happened?"

Jasper shrugged. "She didn't say anything."

"Why didn't _you_? You always boast about how you're going to tell her you love her the second she wakes up. So why didn't you? Why does she have to say it first?"

"She doesn't."

"Then why didn't you saying anything?"

he shrugged again, and then sighed. "I could tell that she didn't want me to tell her anything. She just laid back down in bed, quiet and motionless. I only knew she wasn't in a coma again because she would blink occasionally. I knew she didn't want me to speak, so I didn't."

Ambra shook her head, and whisked around him and the desk, her folder and papers tight against her chest. She sashayed down the hallway to her patient in 489, saying to Jasper without looking to him as she walked, "You should've said something."

Jasper's brow furrowed. Lydia dismissed Ambra by waving her acrylic names at her as she walked down the calls. She turned to Jasper and said, "Sweetie, say it when you're ready, okay? You got that, sugar? 'Cuz if say it when you are not ready, you'll have a mess, and I don't want you having a mess, okay?" Jasper nodded, and Lydia returned to filling out a new patient's charts in a massive blue binder.

Selene and Emma said nothing to Jasper as they scattered themselves out around the hospital. So, after Lydia left to turn the chart in, Jasper was left alone at the Nurses' Station.

Not for long though, of course. When you're at a hospital – patient, doctor, nurse, friend – you're constantly surrounded. You're never alone for more than a few minutes or so.

Doctor Esme stepped out of Alice's room, and Jasper immediately rose, directing his attention to her. She did not look at him though, for she was busily checking some things off in Alice's chart. Jasper waiting for her to look up and see him waiting for her eagerly.

When she did, her expression stayed professional. She walked over to him and the Nurses' Station, and then asked seriously, "Where is Ambra? She's the Charge Nurse today, right?"

Jasper nodded, and Doctor Esme grunted, frustrated.

"What happened?" Jasper asked her, his voice gruff and low.

Doctor Esme immediately relaxed into her usual, motherly self. It was odd how easily she could jump from trait to trait like that.

Smiled warmly, and said, "She's totally fine. I even took her off of the IV. It's literally a miracle. It's like she was never injured. It's really amazing. Of course, we'll be keeping here just for a few checkups, a psychological test we do on all of our comatose patients, and maybe some physical therapy if it's necessary, but that will only take maybe a month, or a little less, depending on how the tests go and how she improves. But trust me, she should be fine, and she'll be out of here in no time!"

"So she's okay?"

"Like she was never in a coma."

Jasper sighed with relief, and even chuckled a tiny bit. Doctor Esme smiled with him.

"Did you tell her you loved her?" she asked, still smiling.

Jasper's smile vanished through, and he looked down at his palms. "No," he whispered, and Doctor Esme's face became serious again, but not in a professional way.

"Why not?" she snapped.

"She didn't want me to . . ."

"Jasper, that is bullshit. I thought she told you she loved _you_ right before she fell comatose."

"She did."

"And I thought you were madly, deeply in love with her, and you wanted nothing more than to explain all of this to her."

"I do."

"Well why didn't you when you had the perfect opportunity? She'd just woken to you, no one else, just you. The first thing she did, even before she took her first breath was _hug_ you. We even left so you could. Why did you push her away?"

The rims of Jasper's eyes became red with sorrow and wear. "Because I love her."

"So tell her." Jasper glanced at Doctor Esme. She was completely serious about this. "Look, Jasper, I know you love her. And she obviously loves you. So, go _tell her_."

Jasper rose shakily. He glanced back several times at Doctor Esme, who stayed put leaning against the desk, her expression warmly serious, as he continued down the hall to Alice's room. He wasn't very sure of what he was doing. He only knew Doctor Esme was telling him. He wasn't telling himself to do anything though.

Jasper grasped onto the doorknob, and turned it, opening it to Alice's room and an expectant, wakened Alice.

**Next chapter will be the best one:)))**


	18. I Consume You

**You guys don't even understand. This song, **_**I Consume You**_** by Rediscover is unrealistically amazing.**

**So, I usually listen to the song whose lyrics I'm using while writing, but I had to turn this song off while writing to resist the urge to dance and sing to it. Yeah, I know.**

**So what, it's been a few days, give me a break. I know it seems odd to randomly have, like, four chapters out at once and then suddenly halt, but I'MMMMM ONLLYYYY HUMANNN (**_**Flowers For a Ghost**_**. Thriving Ivory. :))! Also, I've started beta reading for this really cool girl from Poland, BellaTeam. Her story is E/B, AH, and amazing! Check it out:**

**Again, guys, I'm sorry the font/context last chapter was all screwed up again. I meant to put the A/N before the lyrics, but I failed at the simple errand. Sorry!**

**Enjoy the chapter. Buy this kickass song. Review when you've finished. Peace.**

_I am in . . . side your head . . . Now I'm inside your mouth . . . I will use you . . . I am in . . . side your head . . . You try to get me out . . . But I consume you . . . _

_Have a drink . . . It will help . . . If it's too loud to think . . . I know you want to . . . Look at me . . . It will help if you can move your feet . . . But I'll . . . consume you . . . I'll consume you . . . I'll consume you . . . I'll consume you . . . _

_I locked all the doors so . . . Now you're breaking in . . . Well, you think I'm taking it . . . I'm not taking it . . . You're just faking it . . ._

Alice had just woken up from a six month long coma, and already, her mind was racing about Jasper.

She didn't know what to feel about him. Right before she had fallen comatose, she told Jasper she loved him. She was sure he was worthy of it when she'd said those fatal words though. But now, another, more potent feeling that was so against that was flaring, rearing within her, obviously more prevailing than the former.

She knew she loved him though, that much was the most obvious in her mind. _She loved Jasper. _There was no changing that. She would go to the ends of the earth for him. She would go hell and back for him. She would do anything he wanted her to. She'd never loved someone so much in her entire life, and there was no way to revert back to her previous, loveless state. She loved him. There was no way around _that_.

Everything else within her was at a complete disarray, and it would have been had she been in a coma or not over the past six months.

Alice should love Jasper, and forgive him.

No, Alice shouldn't let him in again. Jasper was there expressly to hurt her, break her down.

So here, she was at a complete loss at what to do, naturally. Should she reconcile with the man she thought she loved? Or trust the dominant opinion within her, and stay away from Jasper because he was only someone who would hurt her in the end?

Eventually, the choice was clear in her mind: she could love him, but he was only going to hurt her, so it was best to just leave him be. He was only there to hurt her. He_ wanted_ to hurt her.

So, she put up her guard. She locked her inner doors, and braced herself for when she would face him again.

Her decision was made. Hastily, yes, but she was sticking to it.

Her schizophrenia had worsened over the period of time she had been comatose.

Alice turned over onto her side in the bed so she could face the window. She peered out of it, and saw that it was a beautiful day outside. And Alice hadn't been outside in six months.

How she longed to be outside! To visit the hospital courtyard, so see shining sun, so feel the lush grass between her toes. She yearned to feel the warmth, the wind, the naturalness of the outdoors. She did not like her hospital room. It was a box with white walls, one shelves, a sink, a mirror, one chair, a TV, and a bathroom. It was plain. Alice wanted vibrancy, whereas this room was plain dullness.

Alice sighed, and started up at the dreary white ceiling. She couldn't take the plainness, so she closed her eyes, and found comfort in the familiar darkness. While it was no more interesting than the whiteness, it was more recognizable and welcoming than ever.

Alice seemed to drift into a dazed state then. She was half-asleep, but more so awake, so when she heard the door open, she snapped awake again, completely aware and sure of herself. And her decisions.

She looked around the room, and her eyes found Jasper. She'd been expecting that Doctor Platt, or maybe a nurse, but no, it was the very man she had decided to give up on.

God, how she'd missed that face though!

Everything about Jasper was golden. His golden locks that flowed like ocean waves that seemed longer than she remembered. His hazel eyes that were seemed more a golden ocher now that she could see him again. And his golden skin, tanned evenly across his entire body.

Memories of sex between she and Jasper suddenly flooded her mind when she thought that. Sweet, sweet memories of the flesh together, lips to lips, lips to flesh, hands to flesh . . .

Alice shook her head to rid herself of those beautiful memories. How she longed to linger in them, immerse herself in the happiness they brought, but she couldn't let herself slip like that. She'd made a decision, and she'd promised to stick to it. She couldn't go back now.

So, she hastily tried to look away from Jasper. But, from the corner of her eye, she saw him smile a smile she had so yearned to see, so she had to look back at him. And yes, that smile was even more beautiful than she ever remembered it being.

Alice squeezed her eyes shut, blocking him. When she reopened them, she was determined to keep them glued to the wall that was directly in front of her, and there _only_.

She heard Jasper sit in the only chair that was right beside her bed. She pursed her lips, resisting the urge to meet his gaze because she knew his beautiful golden eyes were staring at her.

A few moments passed by before Jasper murmured, his voice so velvety that it made Alice shiver, "Hi, Alice."

"Hi," Alice replied almost immediately in a small voice, though her tone was obviously clipped.

More silence passed. It wasn't as maddening as it used to be for Alice. She also felt the urge to blurt things out was missing. She was thankful for these things, but it still felt a bit odd.

Finally, Jasper tried again with a serious, concerned question: "Why won't you speak to me, Alice? What's wrong? Did something happen when you were in a coma, or I . . ." He trailed off, seeming really not to know what was going on with her.

"I . . ." Alice started, but she trailed off too. She didn't know how to answer him.

"Is something wrong?"

she didn't answer this either.

"Is something wrong with your speech? Have you gone mute because of the coma?"

Still no answer.

"Did _I_ do anything wrong?"

Now that was the correct question to ask.

Alice balled her hands into fists. That feeling was telling her this was all insincere. Jasper did not love her. He was not concerned. This was pointless to him, merely a courteous gesture.

All of this made Alice angry.

Her mind continued to spit out all this nonsense about how Jasper did not really want her. Loving him was absolutely pointless. This was _all _just a pointless waste of time. Just shut him out already!

So Alice was spitting angry and ready to do so when Jasper prompted her to answer him.

"I told you I loved you," she hissed. Jasper's expression seemed to lighten, become a little bit hopeful at this remark, but Alice did not notice. She narrowed her eyes. "How irrational."

Jasper's face sank. "What? Why?" he asked frantically.

"I know what you're doing," she sneered.

Jasper was confused. He scooted forward in the chair so he was on the very edge of the seat, closer to Alice. "What? What am I doing? Tell me, Alice!" he pleaded with her.

She crossed her arms over her chest, sending an uninviting message, though Jasper ignored it. "Stop being such a fake," she hissed.

He shook his head. He was both concerned and mildly enraged now. He didn't understand what she was going on about. He didn't understand what he had done wrong to make her act this way. He didn't know how he could help her. He needed answers, but he wasn't receiving any. He needed to know what was wrong. So, he then asked, his voice slightly raised, "_What_ are you talking about, Alice?"

Alice whipped around to look him in the eyes with her hard, fuming stare. "You know exactly what I'm talking about!"

Jasper jumped to his feet and ran his hands through his hair, exasperated. "No, I don't!"

Alice felt a familiar sensation at the back of her throat that usually meant she was going to cry. So, to stop the tears, she quickly derided at a high volume, "Stop it! You're getting inside my head when my mind is already made up! Stop it! Just leave me alone, Jasper!"

"Alice!" Jasper pleaded.

"_Stop_!" she screeched, turning onto her side again, this time so she did not have to face him.

Jasper jogged around her bed to the other side that Alice faced so he could look her in the eyes as he said, "Alice, please listen to me! Just hear me out! I –"

"No! Jasper, please stop, this isn't fair." Alice felt the moisture in the corners of her eyes. But she continued, now sobbing slightly, "You're using me! You're inside my head and I want you _out_!"

"Alice, please, _listen_ –"

"I locked all the doors! I put up my guard! I closed off _everything_. And you're still breaking in!"

"_Alice!_"

This was breaking Jasper's heart in two, straight down the middle. The one he loved believed he was trying to hurt her, and she wouldn't listen to him explain. It was maddening. It was crushing. It was devastating. But most of all, it was just heartbreaking.

Jasper broke down, letting his own eyes fill with tears as well. He shook his head, and tried to reach for Alice, dying to feel the cool skin of her cheek in his palm like before, but she pulled away, rising from her bed. Jasper's eyes widened when she did so. It tore many suction cups and needles from her veins, causing the machines around them to beep wildly. Jasper was fairly sure she was not suppose to get up from her bed.

So, he ran over to her and tried to put his hands on her forearms to help her back into bed, but she tore away from him. It horrified Jasper to see her walk for the first time.

She stumbled about rather than try to walk, her feet twisting around beneath her uncontrollably. She seemed to be in a great deal of pain as she tried as well. It seemed horribly wrong for her to be walking with convulsive, out of control feet and sporadic leg muscles. Jasper ached to help her, but he knew it would only further hurt her as she tried to yank herself away from him.

Alice was panting, leaning against the wall once she had reached her destination. It had obviously taken her a great deal of effort and pain just to walk a few feet away from him.

Jasper seized this opportunity though. "Alice," he commanded tearfully through gritted teeth. She was unable to protest for she was wheezing too badly to utter any other sound, "you're not angry with me because you think I'd hurt you –"

"Stop telling me how I feel," Alice rasped.

"You're just doing what you always do. And I don't know if it's on purpose or not, but you're doing the same thing: you're doubting me. But mostly, you're _yourself_."

"Stop! You don't know _any _–"

Jasper trapped her face in his hands so she couldn't turn away from him. He stared her directly in the eyes and whispered harshly, "Well I won't let that get in the way of this anymore. I let you turn away. You can reject me all you want, but let me say this –"

"I will not let you do this to me!" Alice cried, struggling from Jasper's iron grip on her face, but it was to no avail.

There was no escaping this confession though.

**HAHA you'll hear it next time if you're good enough:)**

**REVIEWS REVIEWS OR SO HELP ME, I'LL RING YOUR LITTLE NECKS!**


	19. Point of Disgust

**YEAH, I'M WRINGING YOUR LITTLE NECKS! ONE REVIEW?! DUDES! REVIEWS ARE VERY IMPORTANT TO ME! I WON'T KNOW HOW I AM WITHOUT THEM!!! SO START REVIEWING AGAIN, PEOPLE!**

**God, this went under so many renovations, you don't even know . . .**

**At first I wasn't going to do a song for this chapter, but I settled on **_**Point of Disgust**_** by Low. It's an incredible song. The piano is beautiful, the lyrics are stunning, the voice is wonderful, and the emotion is overwhelming. What more could you ask for in a sad, but beautiful song like this, really?**

**I know I keep telling you every song I choose is beautiful, but it's true. I choose the purest songs I have to right to. Of course, I listen to other shit stuff that's all popular on the charts (NOT Miley Cyrus, however), so don't think that I only listen to this amazing stuff. Because I do, but I am varied;)**

**So, enjoy this chapter inspired by this beautiful song. I hope you buy it one day. Soon.**

**Try to understand Jasper and Alice in this chapter, please! I know it's going to be hard, but it's all completely rash and explained. You just have to think about it. :)**

**Oh, and yeah, call me a dumbass. Bellateam hasn't put up the link yet so I left you guys empty-handed. Sorry!**

_Then, in the dust . . . All the things . . . We discussed . . . Were thrown to the wind . . . So at last . . . We begin . . . 'Cause we fall hard . . . We fall fast . . . Mercy me . . . It'll never last . . ._

Tears that could not be stopped glided down both Alice and Jasper's cheeks lightly, soundlessly.

This was it. No more excuses. Jasper had to say something. This was no time to run away again. Alice was waiting, and she was listening. This was the time. This was the _right_ time.

Then Alice said in a voice that was much too high and swollen with tears and sobs, "What?"

Instantly, it seemed, Jasper locked his jaw involuntarily, clenching his teeth, as if preventing himself from speaking.

But Jasper knew that he had to. Again, he'd come too far to pretend he hadn't done anything. This wasn't something he could pretend just didn't happen or didn't exist. It did. This was real. And he couldn't run away from it. All his life, he was told running was okay. And it's true, sometimes, it is, but it most cases, like this, Jasper knew that running away wasn't even an option. He had to do this, front and forward.

"Alice, it's because I . . ." Jasper started, but the words seemed to stop there, unable to go on. He cast his eyes to the ground in shame.

Why couldn't he do this? He knew he had to, so why didn't he seem so incapable of saying a few words?

Time was creeping up on Jasper. He had to finish the sentence, but time, shame, and inability were all strangling him without mercy. Why were these three words so damn impossible?

Seconds were ticking relentlessly. Alice was waiting, her expression expectant, annoyed, and worn. The wetness of her skin, caused by the tears, was even beginning to dry.

Jasper sighed, and let go of Alice's soft face. He sank down into the only chair in the room, diverting his eyes from Alice's.

Alice stood there, alone, wondering. She wasn't angry. Or sad. She felt fine. She had long secretly coveted the words that were on the tip of Jasper's tongue, but yet, when he did not say them, but was yet so close to, she did not feel anything. Nothing at all.

She fell down onto the hospital bed, across from Jasper. She stared at his beautiful face, while he stared at something on the floor beside her feet that seemed wonderfully interesting.

More time was passing. Neither of them said anything. They continued to stare. And oddly, both of them were okay with it. They were both okay with avoiding everything, keeping to themselves. They thought they didn't need anyone. The truth was though, they needed each other. And they both sort of knew that, even if they didn't want to say anything about to the each other or themselves.

The attraction in the room was almost unbearable. Both Jasper and Alice knew they were very compatible. Different in many ways, but similar in others. The attraction between the two was like fire: spicy, heated, and very noticeable. It was very hard to _not_ discern this sort of attraction, just like it was very hard to not discern a fire. It was obvious. It was bright. It was right there in front of them, and everyone knew it. Even when Alice was in a coma, they knew it. Everyone did. Everyone but Alice and Jasper themselves, and it was only because both believed they were invincible, and didn't need anyone else but themselves.

Sad passions were ignited in both of them. These passions were different from normal passions though. This sort of passion is quiet, and sad, but it's there, and it's very noticeable as well. But it's depressing. It makes you want to cry. It's merciless too. So within both Alice and Jasper's bodies, hearts, and minds, this sort of fervor was roaring about, but in the most somber of ways. It even brought tears to Alice's eyes, though her face remained motionless and red, even as she said this (it was driven by the sorrowful passions, for it had been a question she'd wanted to ask for some time, but never had), "Are you lonely?"

Jasper looked up from the invisible object of interesting on the floor. He looked up as soon as Alice said this, mostly because of the ardor that was within him as well. But he was confused by her question. Lonely? So, he replied cordially, though rather standoffishly, "Sorry?"

"Are you lonely?" Alice repeated. Tears silently drifted down her cheeks and then dripped off of her chin and onto the floor, but her face was completely stationary in a mask of bleakness.

Jasper shrugged. "Sometimes."

"Me too."

This was also confusing the Jasper. "Huh?"

"Would look like for me to sit at that chair . . . with you? It might make you feel better. You seem so very frazzled and upset because you can't say what you want to."

"No, thank you." Jasper knew that would make things even worst. Well, he _thought_ he knew.

"Why not?"

Jasper couldn't help noticing this was exactly how Alice had been when they first met on that bus. Pure. Simple. Not wild, not insane. Just plain. But in such a beautiful way, it first awed Jasper.

So, Jasper knew he had to be as forward as she was being. Maybe it would lead somewhere. Maybe he'd say what he wanted to. He knew this was probably stupid, but it would do him a dose of good to follow Alice for once, and just be as forward as she.

So, he said hesitantly, "Because . . . I'm scared."

It was sort of . . . cathartic, liberating, to say this. Jasper had never been allowed to be scared before, so he never admitted it out loud to anyone. But at this moment when he did feel so terrified, it was nice to say it out loud, to finally admit it to someone.

"Of what?"

Jasper took a deep breath. He was on a roll. He couldn't stop admitting and being forward now. He could do this. So, he pressed down the inner voice that was telling him to _stop, stop, stop!_, sighed, and confessed in a small, frightened voice, "Falling in love with you."

Alice's face was still a very blank mask, but at this, a mirthless breath that sounded like a laugh, passed through her lips, shaking her shoulders. "And what's so bad about that?"

"Nothing, nothing. I've just . . . I think I'm forbidding myself from falling in love. Currently. Inadvertently though, I suppose."

Another mirthless noise that actually sounded more like laughter than the first echoed from Alice's lips. Her eyes focused on Jasper's, and he realized how distant they'd been before she had decided to focus on him. "And are you forbidding yourself from ever being happy?" Alice replied, her mouth barely moving at all.

Jasper took in a deep breath, closing his eyes for just a second longer. "You don't have to be in love to be happy."

The corners of Alice's beautiful crimson lips popped up slightly. Jasper thought it was a smile, but was very unsure of that observation. "I'm quite sure it helps."

"Oh," was all he could think to say in response.

"Perhaps you could pretend to be happy," Alice then suggested without skipping a beat.

Jasper seemed a little intrigued by that answer. So, he had to ask, "What if it hurts too much to pretend?"

Alice shrugged. The corners pulled up a little bit more, and Jasper because a little bit more sure some emotion was breaking through her mask. Her eyes unfocused again. "Pretend it doesn't hurt."

That confounding answer again left Jasper with only, "Oh."

"It's not that difficult, you know," she continued, as if Jasper had never spoken the syllable.

Jasper wasn't too sure what she was talking about this time. More confusion. And the way her eyes seemed so detached was beginning to scare him a little bit. "What isn't?"

Suddenly Alice rose. The corners of her lips were slightly lifted like they had been just before. Her eyes were focused on Jasper's again now as well, beaming down at him. Her eyes seemed to be alive again though the rest of her face wasn't very much. In her eyes, there was a sort of light. It gleamed over Jasper. He could see it clearly for it was as bright and inviting as even the sun. "Being human."

Jasper stood up abruptly, kicking back the chair. He came forward, and ran his hands through Alice's short, spiky black hair. Their faces were close, a breath away. Alice smoothed her hands up his arms, and them locked her fingers around his wrists like manacles. They both started panting silently. The desire in both their eyes was unbearable and heated. It was scribbled mercilessly across the blues and gold of their eye colors. It was etched painfully into the creases of their skin as both their expressions formed into only simple love and desire. It was so obvious that it was agonizing to stare at it for too long, quite similar to the way it felt when you stared at the sun for too long.

Their faces had gotten closer. The sides of their noses were touching. Alice closed her eyes and whispered to Jasper's lips, barely any air between them, "It's not very difficult at all."

Jasper's forehead crinkled up, the result of a sob. Tears fell. A quiet sob ricocheted from his mouth. He pushed his shaky lips to hers in a delicate kiss. Alice then whispered so very softly in the loveliest voice Jasper had ever heard, "I love you."

Alice soon reopened her eyes after a short pause, and smiled bitterly up at Jasper, tears fresh on her skin and in her eyes, her voice at a normal volume, though high and cracked. "Say it," she rasped.

Jasper took a deep breath. He opened his eyes to, and looked into Alice's. Then, something in him snagged. A pull of some sort. It was then that he realized it was intuition. The intuition he always buried had sprung from the ground to tell him to do this.

"Alice, I love you so much, it consumes me," Jasper poured, every word absolutely true. "_You_ consume me, Alice. Every part of you _intoxicates_ me. You have poisoned me with your beauty, purity, sweetness, loveliness, kindness, and allure. _I love you_ like I've loved no other. _I love you_. And I now know that you love me, too." Jasper squeezed his eyes closed once he'd finished, and turned his face slightly away from Alice's. He didn't know why, but he felt somewhat _ashamed_.

Alice laughed, excited. He'd said it to her! The most beautiful words in the world had finally been spoken to her, and she loved them. She felt lovely. She felt loved. She had never felt better in her entire life. This was what true happiness was like, she knew it was true.

But then it was all hindered, halted. Something in _Alice _snagged now, and she felt it. It was her intuition as well – though her intuition was in disarray, having been affected by schizophrenia – and it was telling her to listen to an important realization: that this could be a lie. This could all be a useless _lie _like she had thought!

There was one way to see if this was a lie or not though. If Jasper could answer this correctly, maybe it wasn't a lie. Alice was hoping with every fiber of her being, with every cell in her body that Jasper answer this damned question right.

She even started to cry again. If Jasper didn't get this right, all of that true taste of any sort of happiness . . .

"Why . . . why didn't you say that when I said it?" Alice sobbed, her cheeks and eyes suddenly glistening.

Jasper was taken aback. What had just happened? One moment, she was laughing. She was happy. But now she was crying again, and asking him a question he didn't understand. This was combined with the damn shame his parents cursed upon him when they told him to never love. The culmination was anger, it seemed. "What?" he asked, slightly calm, but the anger was a little overpowering.

"Before I went to the hospital _six months ago_," Alice explained through gritted teeth.

"What? You mean when you were dying and crying blood?" Alice nodded, but Jasper shook his head and hissed at her, "You really think I was going to say it _then_ – ?"

"Yes!" Alice cried, sobs choking her high-pitched voice. "And when you didn't, I wanted to die!"

Jasper's heart snapped into two. He pulled Alice to him, hugging him close to her, his arms wrapped around her tiny body. He could feel the wetness of her tears seep through his T-shirt rapidly and then dampen his skin. "Hey, hey, hey . . ." he calmed her with a low voice, which was filled to the top with heartbreak.

Alice coiled her own arms around his waist, accepting Jasper, along with his unspoken grief.

"Alice, Alice, hey . . . Do you know happens to snow? After it melts?" Jasper asked her, his tone reassuring and strong, as if speaking to a small, frightened child. He knelt down, and took her hands in his, and looked up at her, like a parent would do when their child was perhaps frightened.

Alice sniffled. "Becomes water?" she answered, unsure, her voice sodden with tears and lost sobs.

Jasper smiled, and wiped away a new fallen tear his thumb. "I suppose, but I was going to say that it becomes _spring_. Winter turns to spring, right?" Jasper grinned a little bit, Alice smiled a fraction, and even laughed, but it sounded like a sob. "You'll be just fine. Because I know everything that goes away is repaid."

Alice was smiling wider at this. "How?"

"Because there are some things I just . . . _know_. Like –" Jasper took a deep breath "– how much I love you."

Alice laughed again. It sounded less like a sob. She knelt in front of Jasper and wrapped her arms around his shoulders, embracing him. "Thank you," she whispered in his ear. "I love you."

"As I love you."

**Okay. Guilty. I was listening to She Wolf when I was writing the last part. Hopefully it doesn't show through;)**

**Reviews, chick-a-dees!**

**So now that this is done, I gotta go do some AP Human Geography shit. Later, bitches.**

**Oh, and if you don't review, I'll lock you in the closet (Shakira said 'closet' right when I typed that . . .).**

**Yeah, I know I'm abusive. I've been told so before;)**

**Oh, and this isn't the last chapter! There's an epilogue, A/N, maybe a Q&A sort of thing (MAYBE), and THEN it will be over. You guys should be tipped off because I ALWAYS put a "The End" when I end my stories:)**


	20. Effigy

**Wanna hear something exciting? I know a guy who looks just like Jasper, and he is HOT! ;)**

**Okay, on a much sadder, let's-get-serious-now-people not, this is one of the most beautiful songs (**_**Effigy**_**, Natalie Merchant; yeah it's old, but beautiful, come on!) I have ever heard ever, with absolutely no exaggeration whatsoever there.**

**It's **_**really**_** sad though because I relate to the song completely, but the emotions in it and the one, short lyric makes it a masterpiece. And it fits my little Alice persona so well, too:)**

**I seriously cried the first time I heard the because of how much it reminded me of myself though . . . And I think only my bestie, Kakabel, would know why.**

_I'm an effigy . . . A parody of . . . Who I appear to be . . . Put your flaming torches under me . . . Endless, so far in myself . . . Follow me . . ._

The beauty of those words was enough to keep Alice alight forever. She threw her arms around his neck, and kissed him passionately, thanking him for his return without any words.

Jasper returned the kiss with the same amount of passion and force. He picked her up and dropped her on the bed, lying over her, but supporting his weight as to not harm her. Alice wanted this more and more by the second, but as she began to pull Jasper's shirt of, they heard the door squeak open and a pair of heels click against the floor disapprovingly.

Jasper scrambled into a sitting position, and Alice licked her lips, sweeping away evidence unsuccessfully, as she saw Doctor Esme and Doctor Carlisle standing in the threshold. They were both smiling. Apparently, they both were in on this secret of Alice and Jasper's.

Jasper was jamming his shirt back on. Alice smiled and greeted them pleasantly, "Hello, Doctors."

Esme continued smiling and replied, "Hello there, Alice. I assume you're feeling a little better?" She scribbled something on a chart.

Alice nodded. "Yes. I can't walk very well though."

"That's to be expected. We'll have to take you to Physical Therapy after your MRI, CAT scan, and Psychological Exam." Alice frowned. "Don't worry! They won't take that long. We just need to check for any imbalances after your wakening. Comas sometimes cause unimaginable psychological damage. It's a precaution, dear."

"Oh."

"Yes, and this is Doctor Carlisle Cullen, your –"

"Like _Edward_ Cullen?" Alice and Jasper's eyes grew wide in surprise and shock at this.

Doctor Carlisle nodded. "Yes. I am his uncle."

"Oh." Their excitement deflated.

"Yes. I am the one who takes care of one of his little friends after an overdose without calling the police on them. It's a courtesy. Edward is going through a rough time after Elizabeth and Edward died in that fire. I've decided to be very lenient with him."

"That's nice."

"Yes, well back to business. I am to be your new psychologist and psychiatrist. It's nice to meet you, Alice."

They shook hands as Alice asked of the couple, her eyes a bit glazed over, "Are you two married?"

Doctor Carlisle let go of her hand, and then wrapped his arm around Doctor Esme, smiling proudly. Doctor Esme even grinned a little bit Alice could see, but tried to hide it by trying to stay professional-looking. "Yes, we are. Esme's kept her first last name; so how did you know?"

"I saw you telling me in a vision when you shook my hand."

The doctors' happiness turned to confusion. "Sorry?"

"I thought someone who have told you . . . Jasper, he knew, he should have told you that . . ." Her sentence seemed to drift off as she looked to Jasper, his face guilty, hers confused. He shrugged and then looked away. Doctor Esme cleared her throat, bringing Alice's attention back to them. Doctor Carlisle was furiously scrawling something on a clipboard. "He knows that I have schizophrenia – he told me himself! That's the indirect reason I ran away from my parents months ago; it's how I met Jasper. It's why I have visions of the future."

"Oh my," Doctor Esme exclaimed quietly, placing a hand over her mouth in shock. Alice shrugged and looked to the floor. Jasper placed his hand over hers softly; she almost didn't notice. She was glad he did so though. She needed him more than anything.

Doctor Carlisle continued to scrawl. Alice did not look up as he nodded and said, staring down at the chart he had just scribbled upon, "Yes, well, a Diagnostics Test will have to be run to be certain of this. I'll have a nurse bring you a wheelchair."

He left the room, Doctor Esme remaining. She smiled warmly and said, her voice low, "You know, we'll need to phone your parents. We were told you had none. It was going to be taken to court. But now we know you do, they'll be able to cover costs and no legal action will be taken against you or the hospital. But we need to know who they are first. Do you remember their phone number? Address?"

Doctor Carlisle came in with a wheelchair. Jasper helped her sit up and into the chair as she shook her head, her mouth twisted into a grim shape, and said quietly, her voice on the verge of breaking, "Yes, both their number and address. But I'd rather not have them here. Please."

He wheeled her to the elevator, Jasper, Doctor Esme, and Nurse Emma with her. In the elevator, Doctor Esme replied, "We're legally required to have your parents or legal guardian know about a medical condition as long as you're under the standard age of eighteen. When you were brought in, you were a confirmed seventeen-year-old. But because you had no known parents or insurance known by your peers, and you were in a coma, legal action was to be taken when you woke. But we know you have legal guardians. Law states they must know."

Carlisle wheeled her into the Psychology Ward. They went down a series of hallways before they came to a room. Inside the room was a table and chairs. Nothing else.

"I'm going to have to interview you vocally, and then we'll get you a scan and then your required scans. We'll just step in here alone, and it will be done as soon as possible," Doctor Carlisle informed her, wheeling her to one side of the table.

Alice's forehead crumpled. "What? Jasper can't come in?" she asked, sounding very distracted.

"No, I'm afraid not. Patient confidentiality. Rules."

She shook her head. "No. I want Jasper to know. Please? Can't he come in with me?"

"No. I'm sorry."

He went over to shut the door, but as he reached for the knob, Alice screamed abruptly, scaring the other four. She then tried to rise from her wheelchair, leg muscles sporadic and unstable, intent on stopping this. She wanted Jasper to be with her.

Immediately, all three rushed to her, and tried to seat her again. But she fought. She didn't want to sit in her stupid wheelchair. She could stand! She was normal. She just wanted Jasper.

However, she was wrong. Standing even for a second was enough to drain all energy from her body. It took all sorts of strength for her to be able to try to stand in her condition. And when she tried to fight them off as well, that only added to the pain and struggle that she felt when she tried to stand and defy her condition. So, soon enough, she fell back as the hands pushed her, so exhausted she was about to pass out. Black spots fell across her vision, and she felt unbelievably winded. Also, the pain in her legs was blazing, spiking against her, causing her to cry.

She fell back into the chair. She was about to pass out, but the pain was keeping her conscious. It was agony though.

Through the back spots, Jasper broke onto her vision, clear as day. As soon as she saw him, she reached out, and grabbed the neck of his shirt. She pulled him toward her, using the last bits of strength she could muster, and then whispered, "Ease my pain . . ."

Then she felt his hand on hers. Then Nurse Emma put something around her face, a breathing device. She was instructed to try to breathe into it; it would help. She did as she was told, and after a few minutes, the black dots faded, her mind, vision, and hearing cleared, and she felt better. The pain in her legs was still unbearable though. She had to grip Jasper hand as she hissed, "Will you please . . . ease my pain . . . ?" He only shook his head, and pressed his forehead to her cheek, kissing her neck. She couldn't tell if he _could_ really do anything or not. "Ease my . . . pain . . ."

Soon the pain turned to throbbing and then to nothing. They would twitch occasionally in warning, but were healed for the most part. Alice could move on her own again without feeling agony again. But it still left Jasper horrified to see his Alice this way: impaired, tortured, unhappy. It scared him. She didn't deserve the pain.

Jasper left the room, and waited out in the hallway with Nurse Emma and Doctor Esme. They did not speak. Only slumped against the walls unprofessionally, waiting for the interview to end.

When Doctor Carlisle finally stepped out the room, wheeling Alice along with him, they all jumped to their feet and stared, not saying anything. Alice looked at her hands, and Jasper saw the humiliation in her beautiful downcast blue eyes. Doctor Carlisle seemed to be tallying up the scores on his clipboard, ignoring Jasper and the others.

He looked suddenly, and said, his smile obviously feigned, "Well, it is confirmed: Alice, you've been diagnosed with schizophrenia. We'll schedule some therapy and I'm going to prescribe a few medicines that may help. We'll, uh, just take you to your required tests now."

The rest of the day was filled with wheeling Alice around, performing various head test, which produced many results that yielded nothing other than her schizophrenia. And it was obvious that Alice was mortified. They all knew it was made worse by knowing her parents were coming, and they would know, too.

The next day, they arrived.

Jasper knew he didn't like them as soon as he greeted them with Doctor Esme and Doctor Carlisle. He also knew that they didn't like him the second they met either.

Mrs. Brandon was tall and unnaturally skinny. Bones protruded from her grossly pink skin everywhere. And that was only magnified by the short low-cut black dress she wore. She wasn't even pretty. She had a sharp face that always looked as if it had sniffed something nasty. Her brown hair was mousy and her makeup was overdone. She wasn't likeable.

Mr. Brandon was stout and stern. He was also considerably shorter than his wife. He was balding, but it was obvious he had thick black hair. He wore large, rounded glasses and had a mustache. His face was slightly more relaxed than Mrs. Brandon's, but he was too stern to be seen as likeable. He wore a shabby black suit and tatty red tie, and his matching black shoes were scoffed. He was no more likeable than his spouse.

Doctor Esme, Doctor Carlisle, and Jasper were waiting in the hospital lobby for them in the morning. Jasper wanted to stay with Alice as he had overnight, but she insisted she leave him. If she didn't get to see the outside of her room, he should.

The first thing that happened when they walked in was Mrs. Brandon shout in her nasally voice, "Where is Alice?"

This turned heads, and Doctor Esme immediately rushed over to quiet her by greeting, "Hello, you must be the Brandons." They did not confirm, only shook her hand. "I'm Doctor Esme Platt, and this is my husband and your daughter's psychologist and psychiatrist –"

"Who is this?" Mrs. Brandon asked in her flat voice, casting a sideways glance at Jasper. Jasper already knew he did not like this couple, so he did not smile, not even for Doctor Esme or Doctor Carlisle.

Doctor Esme laughed nervously, clapped her hands together, and then stuttered, "Uh, well, this is, uh, the, uh, boyfriend. Jasper Whitlock. He's, yes, he actually, er, saved her by, uh –"

"Boyfriend, huh?" Mr. Brandon interrupted, staring at Jasper alongside his wife. "Alice doesn't have _boyfriends_."

Doctor Esme threw him a pleading look, silently begging him not to cause a scene, but he could not help himself this time. Jasper shrugged and smiled bitterly at them. He then asked them, obviously in all fake sincerity, "Why not?"

Mrs. Brandon snorted and waved a hand at him. "Alice isolates herself from friends. She has none. She's a pathetic loner! That's why she cuts herself, you know." Mr. Brandon grunted a laugh. Jasper could already tell Mrs. Brandon was a gossiper.

Doctor Esme laughed loudly, obviously faked, to distract from a nasty conversation, but Jasper was already fired up. He just couldn't take that. "Alice is one of the most beautiful girls in the entire world. She's absolutely gorgeous _and _amazing, and I fucking love her. Don't you dare speak that way about her. She is not pathetic or a loner because she has friends now. And she does not cut herself anymore."

Mrs. Brandon strutted closer to him, her heels clicking against the floor menacingly, but Jasper was not afraid. "For god's sakes, and who the hell are you? Some pathetic loser who picked her up in an alleyway, drugged her, dragged her home and raped her while she was unconscious to help your self-caused loneliness who she just called her boyfriend because she didn't have anyone else to go to?"

Doctor Esme and Doctor Carlisle gave him shocked stares, as if it were all true. Jasper rolled his eyes and said, "No. I met her on a bus because we both had nowhere to go. We crashed at my cousin's house, who is his –" he jerked a thumb at Doctor Carlisle "– nephew, by the way, and fell in love. Sure, tons happened in between, though none of it fits your assumption, but that's it in a nutshell. Ask her yourself."

Doctor Esme and Doctor Carlisle exchanged nervous, unsure glances, but then Jasper shot them a look that said, "Would you really believe her over me?", and they melted into smiles. They trusted Jasper.

Mrs. Brandon snorted, and then walked away, snapping her fingers as she asked, "Doctor Whatever, where's my daughter?"

The next few days were filled with lawyers, insurance claims, and family squabbles. Eventually, Mr. and Mrs. Brandon admitted they could care less about Alice, and agreed to allow her to stay with Edward. They would pay for her medical bills and that was it. Alice didn't want to go to school, and they weren't going to make her. As long as she called once a month until she was eighteen, everything was golden. That was the agreement they all eventually settled on, and it was a good on. No one wanted any part in each other, it seemed. It was two weeks after Alice had woken from her comatose state when her parents left. That was the day when everyone came to visit her, too.

Edward, Bella, Rosalie, and Emmett all crowded into her room, wishing her well and congratulating her. It was a joyous occasion, and Alice was only too thrilled to have everyone together.

Edward had stayed the same: the bronze-haired, mysterious chain-smoker, just like always. Bella hadn't changed much either, now that she had been discharged; she just paler than Alice remembered. And Emmett and Rosalie were still the beautiful honeymoon couple who couldn't keep their hands off each other. Yes, everything was basically the same, and it was such a nice thing to see for Alice and even Jasper.

The reunion was made sweeter by the news that Alice was to be discharged soon. Maybe even the very next day!

Everything was good, everything was sweet. Everything was as lovely as it had been before, and for that, Alice was so grateful. The only thing was she herself felt so different. Like the girl she had been was just an effigy of what she really was. Of course she was the same, but she was so different, too. Jasper didn't seem to mind much though he noticed the differences as well, so Alice didn't want to care very much either, but it was still right there and obvious. She only remembered herself as an effigy of what she was there, at the reunion, after. But as Jasper had said when she confided in him about this privately after everyone had left, "Effigies don't have to be all bad if they make you stronger." Then she kissed him, and they had another intimate moment that was more needed that ever.

**Awh!!**

**No, this is not the end! An epilogue is in order, of course:)**

**REVIEW REVIEW REVIEW! IT WAS BETTER THIS TIME, SO KEEP IT COMING! COME ON, COME ON!!**


	21. Satellite Heart

**So yeah, this is pretty crappy. No need to remind me in the REVIEWS when you leave me one. :)**

**BTWubs, this is my favorite song from the New Moon soundtrack, so of course, I had to use it for some kind of inspiration:) Well, why not this piece of crap?! :)**

**Okay, ALSO, this isn't the only song that influenced the chapter. Official songs of inspiration include: _A Lack of Color_**** by Death Cab for Cutie, _Satellite Heart_**** by Anya Marina, _Brothers on a Hotel Bed_**** by Death Cab for Cutie, and a little bit of _Ease My Pain_**** by Declan Flynn. How's THAT for musical education?!**

**Fucking cheers.**

_So pretty, so smart . . . Such a waste of a young heart! . . . What a pity, what a sham . . . What's the matter with you, man? . . . Don't you see it's wrong . . . Can't you get it right? . . . Out of mind and out of sight . . . Call on all your girls, don't forget the boys . . . Put a lid on all that noise! _

_. . ._

_I'm a satellite heart . . . Lost in the dark . . . I'm spun out so far . . . You stop, I start . . . But I'll be true to you . . . _

_. . ._

_I hear you're living out of state . . . Running in a whole new scene . . . They say I haven't slept in weeks . . . You're the only thing I see . . ._

_. . ._

_But I'll be true to you, no matter what you do . . . Yeah I'll be true to you . . ._

It was going to be a great day. Alice was possibly going to be discharged, Doctor Esme had told Jasper and Alice has she did her final checks before she left for the night. "We'll need to run just one more test though, that's all," Doctor Esme assured. "It's only to see if your schizophrenia is deteriorating or progressing, that's all."

"What if it's deteriorating?" Alice asked, childlike, as she watched Nurse Emma fiddle with her IV machine.

Doctor Esme paused. She'd been scribbling a few things on her ever present chart, but suddenly stopped. Her eyes drifted upward slightly. "What's that?" Her voice was high and pinched.

"What if it's deteriorating, what if_ I_ am deteriorating?" she repeated.

Doctor Esme gave a curt chuckle. "We'll have to keep you here longer, that's all. But it may not be!" she added when Alice began to frown.

Just then, Jasper entered the room. He routinely went over to Alice, whose frown had immediately been flipped to a giddy smile the moment he walked in. He leaned over her, and pecked her little lips. He pulled back, and they both smiled, staring happily into each other's eyes like a just-married couple would. Doctor Esme smiled, turned, and left, Nurse Emma following.

"Oh,"Alice groaned. "They've left?"

Jasper turned. "Yes," he confirmed, a bit confused. "What? You like being poked and prodded now?" He smiled gently, jokingly, as he went over to sit in the bedside chair.

Alice grinned. "No, but she has some bad news I'd rather her give than me."

Jasper swallowed and grinned quite weakly. "Oh?"

Alice sighed. "Oh, Jasper, please!"

Jasper rose swiftly, but turned his back to her. "What?"

"Please don't start this again; if I'm not as worried as you are about_ me_, you are officially being overly concerned, didn't we decided on that? Didn't we _establish _that?"

Jasper sighed and turned to face Alice once more. "Yes . . ."

"So no freaking out when I tell you this news, alright?"

"Fine."

"Promise?"

Jasper smiled. "Yes."

He came over to sit in the chair beside Alice's bed once more. "Well," she started, looking away, "Doctor Esme is doing a final test to see if my schizophrenia is deteriorating or progressing." A lump formed in Jasper's throat. "If it's progressing, I'll be fine, and can be discharged from the hospital tomorrow. But, if it's not, if it's deteriorating, I'll be kept here as long as it takes for them to keep from going completely insane." It took every ounce of strength for Jasper to not cry out in surprise and concern.

"Really?" he settled on.

"Yes. I know it's a little worrying, and I am worried; I don't want to be stuck here forever! But you cannot throw a hissyfit and start going crazy over this. I know I'll be fine."

"When are the test results due?"

"Tomorrow morning, bright and early, as soon as Doctor Esme comes in for her routine morning checks."

Jasper tittered a bit, but tried to hide it, and successfully he did. Alice settled in her bed, smiling. Jasper joined her, and the two spent the rest of the night playing cards, talking about when she would be discharged, and watching old movies on the hospital provided television set. But soon enough, Alice grew drowsy, and fell asleep. Jasper clicked off the old movie they were watching, and settled down with her as well, forming around her shape, his arms draped over her side, hands concealing hers in the ever protective envelop of his warm hands. She fell asleep promptly; Jasper knew because Alice's breathing always became a bit more labored when she fell asleep. And the moment Jasper heard her heavier breathing that night – so peaceful in the surrounding darkness – he could no longer sleep himself. Because he needed a reason for her to stay in his arms there.

So as Jasper lay there, staring at the focusing wall in front of him, listening to Alice's breathing, arms wrapped around her, his mind began to wander. And that was when he remembered that night her tests were finally being processed, and in the morning, they would know if she would slowly descend into madness or be able to get better.

This kept Jasper up. He even removed himself from his Alice, who did not stir, and rolled around the bed, trying to erase the stain of this thought from his mind. But the more he tried to eradicate it, the more it seemed to embed its nasty self into his memory. It was so very nasty though because Jasper knew everything would change if tests came back saying she was a deteriorating schizophrenic. Yes, everything.

If she was deteriorating, meaning she couldn't get better, they would keep her here for longer, or maybe in an asylum soon. And he'd never be able to see her. And they'd both slowly fade from each other, kept apart tragically. But of all of the melodramatic prediction, one was completely realistic and possibly true: Alice would slowly descend into madness. There was only so much medicine and therapy could do. And even if they kept her there forever, constantly feeding her pills and having therapy sessions, she would end up crazy in the end anyway.

Jasper felt a pinch at the back of his throat that usually meant he was going to cry. So, he rose from the bed, unable to even be in the same room with the one who harbored this thought and the exported it to him, even though he loved her so. But he had to get out of that room.

He leapt from the bed and tiptoed out of the door, but not before checking the clock. Four. It was four in the morning. Jasper hadn't realized how much time had passed, but he shrugged and sped from the room as quietly as he could.

Jasper looked around. The hospital was eerily quiet. It was usually teeming with life and death, but in those moments of the ungodly hours of the morning, it was vacant. Well, there was a nurse at the Nurses' Station, but she was fast asleep, her arms on the counter and her head within them. She didn't have much work to do, it seemed.

Jasper dragged his feet toward the bench a few feet away from Alice's door. He kept the door open in case she needed him later in the night.

He sat upon the bench and sighed. He calculated that Doctor Esme would be here in about two and a half hours to run through her daily, early morning checkup on Alice. She would bring the test results with her. Jasper's stomach flipped.

Jasper shook his head wearily. His vision was fading and suddenly the overwhelming realization that the test result would be here in a matter of hours now seemed to drain him of his energy. He could no long worry or fret because he didn't have the power anymore. And with that, Jasper timely fell asleep on the bench right there.

Of course, Doctor Esme soon awakened him. She tapped him lightly on the shoulder, and his eyes snapped open. "What? What is it?" he asked, looking around, sleep still in his expression.

Doctor Esme smiled sadly. Bad news. Jasper could see it there in her little face.

"Oh, Jasper, I'm sorry," she whispered.

"What is it?" Jasper pressed, afraid of the answer he knew he would receive.

Doctor Esme sighed, and bit her lower lip. "Jasper, she's deteriorating. And a rapid, almost irreparable rate. I'm so sorry, but some things are the way they are." Doctor Esme looked down at her hands trembled.

"How long will she be here?" Jasper asked, his lips quivering like her hands.

"There was nothing you could do, so we won't know." That was really code for, Jasper knew, forever. "There's nothing we _can _do now but maybe try some psychotherapy and maybe even some prescription drugs later on. All we can shoot for is this not getting any worse than it already is."

"So, forever."

She sighed. "Possibly. Maybe an asylum would be a better place though."

And with that terrifying last comment, she turned and left Jasper alone in the hospital hallway to wonder and to grieve to himself.

What would he do?

Of course, he loved Alice; he loved her with all his heart and would never stop. It was a ceaseless fountain of love, and as corny and cheesy as that sounded, Jasper knew it was true, and he wasn't going to step away from it. He loved her and she loved and they had each other, and that was all that really mattered to both Alice and Jasper. But Jasper now had something that was blocking this; oh, how his heart would crack when Alice spiraled into insanity. He knew she wouldn't get better, and when the whole thing finally culminated, Jasper wouldn't be able to do anything but watch his feeble Alice become insane. He knew all of this. How he would deal with that when the looming day came, he did _not_ know.

What would he do if Alice were crazy? Would she be too crazy to remember him, to function? Would she be here forever? What was their future together now that they knew Alice was severely schizophrenic? Anything? Did they have anything together anymore?

Jasper felt like bursting into tears. Everything was uncertain and murky now. They were uncertain and murky now. What would they become? Anything? Anything at all?

He paused. Wait.

Would Alice . . .

Would she even remember she loved him? Would she go so crazy she wouldn't even be able to recall the ones she loved? Namely, _him_, Jasper Whitlock? Would she remember anything in the end?

Jasper stopped, and memories instantly flooded him. Their beautifully awkward meeting on a public bus; their first night together, drugged and asleep in the same bed with no sexual tension whatsoever; their first kiss; his jealousy; the scene at the bar; their confrontation outside the bar after the scene; the passionate kisses all the way home; their first time together, so brilliantly beautiful and like no other Jasper had ever experienced, and all of those times after. They opened up to each other completely, exposing themselves in intimacy. And it had been truly beautiful. He had had an Earth-Bound heart then, one that was close to home, close to his little pixie, his little love, Alice. But now, his heart was a Satellite Heart, lost in the darkness of the unknown among the unfamiliar stars that drifted there too. He didn't know what to do or where to go. There were points of light and reason, but no meteor to guide him home anymore.

Jasper ran his hands through his golden locks and sighed deeply. Such a waste of a beautiful young heart it was.

"Hey," a sudden melodic voice permeated Jasper's bubble. It was wrought with unworried concern. "What the fuck're you doing, Jasper?" It was Edward, of course.

Jasper stared upward at him, watching his wavering green eyes and sighed again. "Nothing," he replied.

"You okay?"

"No."

"Why?"

"Alice is schizophrenic." He rubbed his face with his hands. "And she won't get better. Ever, it looks like."

"Oh," was Edward's only remark as he took the seat beside Jasper's on the bench.

"I don't know what to do about Alice."

There was a slight pause. Edward sighed, and the shrugged and asked very seriously but casually because the answer he gave was quite simple, "Well, what _is there _to do?"

That simple question made Jasper think. And honestly, he didn't know the answer to that. He couldn't think of any words to even respond. Edward had a valid point. Were there even options anymore?

Jasper shrugged as well. "Well, I was hoping you could tell me. You're like a brother to me."

"What do you want me to say? That everything will be all right? Everything will be peachy? Because I don't know if I can lie to you like that if I'm your brother."

"But I need you to tell me everything will be all right."

"But I _can't_."

"Why the fuck _not_?"

"Because I don't know if it's going to be all right or not. I'm no smarter than you are, Jasper." Jasper gulped, and his face paled to the color of milk. Edward noticed this, and sighed, taking pity. "I can't say this for certain, but if you really love her, maybe things will turn out all right after all. Don't hold me to it though."

Jasper grinned widely. One of his brightest smiles. "I don't need it to be true. But as long as I have something to work for that someone gives me, I can manage on my own after that."

Edward clapped him on the back, grinning a crooked grin. "I'm glad. You're strong, Jasper. You're a strong guy. I can see why Alice loves you as much as she does. She's really in love with you Jasper. Crazier in love than even Emmett and Rosalie."

Jasper chuckled. "I know."

"You'll be okay."

"I know. I'm going to talk to her."

"Good."

Jasper rose, and entered the room right as Doctor Esme was leaving. "She's awake," she whispered as she left.

Jasper casually drifted into the room. "Hi," he greeted, smiling a tiny bit. It was a nervous smile though. A very nervous smile, indeed.

Alice yawned. "Hey you. The doctor told me."

"You'll be here a while?"

"I guess so. I was so looking forward to being discharged . . ."

"I know, love."

Jasper came to Alice, and laid beside her in the bed again, just like always. He wrapped his arm around her, letting it be the pillow for her delicate head. His other arm's hand traced ghostly patterns on her skin. Alice sighed happily but sadly, as her voice was filled with hidden sorrow at the same time as utter euphoria. "Tell me a story," she whispered.

"A story?" Alice nodded. "Well alright . . . So once there was a boy. And he was a lowly peasant boy who also thought he was shit, not worth anything. But one day he met a beautiful girl who was very stunning. She had a brilliant personality that shined and an amazing face that glowed with radiance. He fell in love with this girl. He really fell hard in love with this girl. But who could not? No one could resist this beautiful girl. But by some error of luck and chance, she fell hard in love this boy, too. So, they were in love. And though the girl had a consumption, the boy loved her anyway. And her consumption was cured. And they lived happily ever after, dying together when they were a million years old. The end."

Alice smiled, drifting off into sleep, it seemed. But her smile was still strong. "That was a beautiful story, thank you."

"Sure th -"

"You know when I see you, I really see you upside down? But my brain knows better; it picks you up and turns you around. So, this means that Jasper, if you ever feel discouraged because there's a lack of color here," she waved her hands in the air, indicating the hospital, "please don't worry, lover, because," Alice got very close to Jasper's ear, and whispered, "it's really bursting at the seams because it's absorbing everything." Alice pulled away and shouted so sadly, tears beginning to stream down her pale cheeks, "So now, I slur a plea for you to come home even though I know it's too late because I should have given you a reason to stay . . ."

Alice sobbed, and Jasper immediately ran to Doctor Esme, who was at the Nurses' Station, filling out a new patient's chart. She looked up at him from beneath her eyebrows as she won't turn her face away from her work when Jasper asked, "What's wrong with her?"

"Medication. It's just some extra stuff we've given to ease the pain."

Jasper clutched his Satellite Heart as it drifted deeper into a blacker space, and left.

**Sweet, hmm? :)**

**Yeahhh, leave a FUCKING REVIEW and tell me what you think. Stop IGNORING ME!!**


	22. Epilogue: Signs

**Final chappy. It's been such a long ride:) Thank you guys for supporting me and writing reviews when you could. I appreciate it. I hope you've enjoyed the story, and you'll leave a little farewell review. See ya on the flip side, bitches;)**

** Oh, also, I'm going to be coming out with another story soon. I have it all planned and everything. Stay tuned for it! :)))**

**Bye, hunss:)**

_I see signs now all the time . . . The last time we slept together, there was something that was not there . . . You never wanted to alarm me, but I'm the one that's drowning now . . . I could sleep forever these days . . . Because in my dreams, I see you again . . . But this time fleshed out fuller face in your confirmation dress . . . It was so like you to visit me to . . . Let me know you were okay . . . It was so like you to visit me . . . Always worrying about someone else . . ._

_I believe in anything that brings you back home to me . . ._

So, it's been a while since all of that crazy shit has happened. Well, maybe not a while, but it definitely feels like it's been an absolute eternity. I hate this fucking place. Everyone is taking care of you all the time. Everyone treats you real special, like you're some sort of rare species of animal that is maybe the last on earth, and needs to be taken care of so preciously. It's annoying. I hate it. Nothing is right. And it really doesn't help that Jasper isn't around me as much as he would be. He works during the day. And by works, I mean sells drugs in the dark alleyways far away where Edward's old apartment use to be. And he's gone everyday, all day, which sucks, because there's nothing but psychotherapy but physical therapy for me to do. I'm still learning how to walk again.

So Jasper is always gone. And I miss him so much. He's all I think about during the day, and I really can't help it. I guess it's this love thing I'm still trying to understand wholly.

"Alice? Are you ready for your routine checkup?" Nurse Emma murmured as she cracked the door of my hospital room just enough to stick her head. She's so quiet and stealthy that it startles me a bit every time she comes in because I never hear her at first until she speaks up in her tiny voice. But I'm adjusting to her stealth.

I sigh. I hate this. "Yeah, whatever," I reply, surly.

She and Nurse Sage bustle in, and started working on all of my crazy machines. I don't even know what half of them _do_. There are several that connect to odd places on me: my back, the insides of my elbows, my wrists, my stomach, and even my chest. It's an odd thing to have so many tubes and needles stuck to me, connecting me to strange machines that I don't even know the purpose of. I always wish that I could ask them what these stupid machines are for, but they never answer. I've actually asked many times, but never received an answer. Yes, that's what I meant. I've asked, but never received an answer for what these machines do to me.

Time just passed. I don't really know. I think my mind just blurred, and blocked out everything going on. Because the nurses are leaving now, and I hear the elevator on the other side of the wall ding precisely on time, and I know who it is. Without a moment too late or too soon, Jasper comes in, looking worn but happy. He's happy to see me.

My mind is confused. As he bends down to peck my lips delicately, I'm barely there, kissing him automatically, but panting slightly, looking on glassily, a bit worriedly. But I snap out of it as soon as I fell into it. Jasper is stripping himself of his worn leather jacket, smiling slightly but sadly, it seems. "Another dizzy spell?" he asks without much emotion. He's doing a good job of that. It calms me though I know it hurts him sometimes.

"No, no," I answer him, holding my forehead in my sweating palms. "I seemed to have lost track of time somehow. My mind blurred. And I was sort of dizzy, short of breath, I guess."

"Should I tell Doctor Esme?"

"Unnecessary."

"Today was good. I sold a lot of pot not very many pills though. I'll have to do some sort of deal tomorrow to get rid of these things. They'll spoil soon, won't they?"

I smiled. "I don't really think pills spoil."

"Oh well. I feel tired, but I'm happy to see, as always. Seeing you brightens my day. I'd be old and tired every day of my life, unhappy and grumpy. But you make everything all right. I've been doing well, actually. And I think it's because I have you."

So incredibly sappy, but I love to hear Jasper talk about himself and his day. It was never like him to do so because he was always fretting over other people, namely _me_. But I asked him to stop. And I asked him to talk about himself more, because now that I was drowning faster and faster, there was no use in fretting. It wouldn't solve anything. Things were just going to be the way they were, and no amount of worry or concern could reverse them. So I asked him to talk about himself. Because it made me feel good. It made me happy to hear him doing good. Because even though he was out there, living a real life, I loved to hear about it. I was never resentful. It made me feel better. It was so like him to worry about everyone around him, but I asked this of him and agreed. And he's doing a good job, I'm proud. I hope I won't ever forget him.

"That's good. I like hearing about your day, you know," I remind him absentmindedly.

"I know."

I look up from the miniscule point on my blanket that I had been staring at. I smile an odd smile. It's very lopsided. An odd smile; perhaps, one of quite a crazy person.

"Are you feeling good?" he asks, sitting down at the foot of my bed, slumped over like a comma.

I narrow my eyes at him, warning him, but I answer anyway. "Boring, as usual," I say quietly.

"What?"

I furrow my brow. "What?"

"What did you just say?"

"I said, 'Boring, as usual.' Because for fuck's sake, it _was_. Terribly long and arduous. I hate this place –"

"No. At first you said, 'Bonsual as.'"

I laugh. "'_Bonsual_'? I meant to say, 'boring' and 'usual,' I believe."

Jasper's lips don't even flinch in a smile. He hasn't smiled truly in a long time, and it hurts my heart. Burns it, scars it. "You're mixing your words more. You've noticed that?"

"Yes."

He gives me a knowing glance before sighing, and drifting off. He seems to stare at nothing in particular, as I do often. But I don't want him to become like_ me_. "Jasper?" I whisper, reaching out my hand to wrap around his. "I love you." It's sort of mumbled.

He turns to look at me, and smiles. "You know I love you too."

I raise an eyebrow. "Do I? Show me."

I see his playful side glint beneath his honey eyes. It's rare that I see it anymore. He's much more careful around me. When we have sex, he's delicate. He doesn't take it as far as I like, as he used to. I think he thinks he will break me because I'm so breakable now. But I'm not. I'm strong. I'm not weak and fragile like he believes I am. I swear it.

Jasper's sweet lips meet mine, and I wrap my arms around him, pushing my lips to his hard, trying to show that I am not as fragile as he believes. But he pulls back, and bites his lip. I sigh, but do not pull back. I stay close. "There's confidence in the brokenness. And it's beautiful, Jasper. It's beautiful." He continues to stare through me with his glassed-over worried stare. It's glassy because he's trying to cover it up. It's progress. I sigh again. "There's a rule where your heart is," I warn. "You better switch them again. I like the heart better." I try to smile playfully. He barely notices I've said anything at all.

I think he spaces when he's upset or worried.

No sex tonight. But I still feel close to him as I snuggle close into his welcoming arms later tonight. Touch is the only way we can successfully display anything without the fears of frailty and fragility. So, every night, I welcome the darkness because that's when Jasper welcomes me, and I feel whole again. That's why I don't complain.

I fill the gap he's made for me, and nuzzle into him. He's asleep in moments. I know what the stress and concern do to him. That's so like him to worry about someone else.

I have no difficulty sleeping as well. Not because I'm tired or stressed like Jasper, but because I love my dreams. Because in my dreams, I see Jasper again, but in the way were before real life caught up with us. When we were _really_ in love. Like it is right before we both fall asleep in the night, but all the time. And that's why dreams are everything to me now. I even write them down so I don't forget them.

In this dream though, there's just a dove. It's different from the others; this doesn't involve Jasper or I. it's just a little white dove. And it's got an olive branch in its beak. And it's smiling. I can see it, despite the hard beak. It's really smiling. And offering peace.

It's promising a hopeful future. A vision.

**THE END**


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